• 1-Dreams

Please be aware of the slight AR nature for some of the characters, I've kept some canon ideas but not all, roughly kept up until OOTP with some canon from HBP but essentially the canon ends at the end of OOTP, made it work for the story. Thank you! Please read and review. Apologies for the length as a heads up the smut doesn't start until near the end. There are now several sequels which you can find under my user profile. Edited: 27/07/09

***

It was hot.
The kind of night where sleep seems impossible and yet the resting party wants
to fall asleep so badly they feel they’d happily pass up a limb or two for the
privilege. Every window was open but no breeze could be enticed in. Not even a
warm breeze. And what made it worse was the fact that it was only early May,
too early in the year for such temperatures.

Ron opened
his eyes to the sound of a groan from the other side of the dormitory. Any
other night, the sound probably would have sent him into girlish giggles as
immaturity was prone to render him to. However tonight he knew nobody was
having any kind of fun at all, and that whoever it was probably as hot,
frustrated and stinking as he was.

“Alright,
who’s awake?” he asked, his voice groggier than he’d expected.

“Me.”

“I am.”

“How am I expected to fucking sleep in this?!”

“The point
of coming to school in Scotland
was that it was going to be cold for most of the year. My allergies kick up in
the heat,” Neville whinged, followed by a sneeze. Ron suspected Neville was
more awake than the rest from the coherency of his frustration.

“There has
to be some kind of spell we can do to make this colder,” Harry said irritably,
sitting up and punching the pillow angrily.

“They
should provide it,” Seamus muttered, “They’re meant to be looking after us,
they’re a school.”

“Or they
think we should use our ingenuity and perform the spell ourselves if we want
it,” Neville threw in lightly.

Four heads
swivelled round to stare and glare at him and he blushed. “Well come on. We’re
in our last year and not one of us remembers anything to reduce temperature?”

In his
tiredness, Ron gauged that Neville probably had some kind of point with his
argument, but it was the same tiredness which stopped him from presenting
support and instead only mustered a faint blank stare. A quick glance at his
clock told him it was two in the morning.

“We need
Hermione,” Harry muttered, blearily rubbing sleep from his eyes. He swung his
legs off the bed.

“Alarms,
slides, no touching the girls at night time, remember?” Dean called from his
bed in a bored voice, as though he’d read Harry’s
mind and knew his comment about Hermione was about to be turned into action.

“Bollocks.”

“Bane of my
life, that rule,” Seamus sighed.

“Amusement
for the rest of us, however,” Ron laughed. “Seriously, how many times so far
this year?”

“97.”
Seamus sounded pleased.

“Your
mother must be so proud,” Dean snorted.

Ron closed
his eyes again as the dormitory descended into it’s usual bout of ‘your mother’
taunting, always carried out with a heavy hint of irony and care considering
one of them had no mother, and another might well as not have. After seven
years, the insults had become less inventive and moved on to being well worn
clichés. Nobody took any offense any more, but still, they tried to not go too
far.

“Well,
Seamus, do you fancy having another crack at beating the system?” Harry asked
lazily.

Neville had
already resolutely pulled himself out of bed and was heading for the adjoining
bathroom. Suddenly he stopped; Ron could make him out reading something on the
wall.

“I didn’t
write it, whatever it says,” Seamus said, falling back on his pillows with his
arm covering his eyes.

“What?” Harry
yawned, “Wrote what?”

Neville
laughed. “How many years have we lived in this dormitory?”

“Er, nearly seven years… seven looong
years. Seven years of your snoring.” Dean complained.

Neville
flipped him the finger and continued, “Well in seven years did one of us think
about reading the flipping safety instructions and guidelines stuck to the wall
next to the door?”

“The what now?”

“The safety
instructions and living guidelines as issued in,” Neville laughed again,
“1954?”

“Is there a
point to this or are you just getting all reminiscent about the fact this’ll
all be over soon? I don’t have time for that. I have to be somewhere very
important.” Dean rolled over. “Asleep.”

“The point
is that the cooling spell has been on our wall for seven years and not one of
us stopped to look at it.”

“Are you
fucking kidding me?” Ron tore himself from his mattress and stomped to the
door. He peered at the old parchment. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

“Language!”
Dean rolled his eyes, and twiddled his wand in his fingers whilst reading over
the instructions.

“Oh, sweet
heaven,” Seamus crooned as he settled his blankets around him. “Sweet cold air.”

“Seven
fucking years,” Dean groaned. “Seven years. Every summer this happens and every
summer we sweat. Like pigs. Oh, I am so cross.”

Ron
suppressed another laugh, Dean had such an olde worlde way of speaking
sometimes. His mother used the word ‘cross’ and everyone else used ‘mad’ or
‘angry’ or ‘pissed off’. He yawned. Yes. The dormitory was much more pleasant
this way. He turned onto his side and felt thankful. So
thankful…

***

Ron didn’t know where he was. The
sky was blue, and there were some little fluffy white clouds puncturing the
surface. It was nice. The lake was sparkling. He could feel the heat bouncing
off the floor back up to his face. He knew he should get into the shade. He
didn’t want to resemble a lobster. It was then that he realised his feet were
carrying him with purpose to the side of the lake, underneath a tree. When he
arrived, he felt himself looking around, folding his arms over his chest,
recognised he was waiting for somebody. Who? This was weird. He didn’t remember
arranging to meet anybody.

There was a nervous feeling in his
stomach. Whoever he was meeting, it was important. But then why couldn’t he
remember arranging to meet whoever it was? He felt even more confused as he
scanned the grounds and saw only one figure moving, but it was nobody of
consequence. He looked out over the lake and didn’t see anybody there, either.
Starting to feel angry as well as confused, he flopped down on the grass and
continued to glare into the sunlight.

“Hello,” a musical voice filtered
down, and he looked up abruptly. There was the person of no consequence who had
been on the grass when he’d last looked. And now, he was standing next to him.
Ron was even more confused.

“Hello,” he replied.

The man sat down next to him and
smiled. “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” Ron replied, “You?”

Utter confusion. He wasn’t
controlling the words coming out of his mouth. If his confusion was registering
on his face, the other man wasn’t acknowledging it.

“I’m… alright. Better
for seeing you, of course.”

Against his will Ron found his lips
stretching into a broad grin. And even worse, his hand lifted to brush away
some wisps of hair fluttering over the man’s eye.

“Always the charmer,” he heard
himself say wryly, with a hint of flirt in his tone.

Could this be any weirder?

Yes. The man leaned in and their
lips connected. Now the feeling of confusion was mingled with something else
that he couldn’t pinpoint… excitement, heat, a rush of affection, happiness.
His mind was screaming random phrases. “Are you mad?” “What the hell?”

The man had sunk a hand into his
hair and was pulling his face closer. Everything about it seemed so wrong and
yet Ron couldn’t understand why he wasn’t pulling away, screaming for help, shouting obscenities at the man. The man who’s name was
escaping him at the present. The man whose tongue was very definitely invading
the personal space of his mouth, but his body really didn’t seem to mind. In
fact, mind wasn’t the word - ‘like’, ‘love’ and ‘wanting more’ were all better descriptions.

And now what was he doing? Wrapping
his arms around him, feeling alive, falling down to a
lying down position in the cool grass, being kissed. Liking
it. More kissing. A cool hand caressed the side
of his face and he closed his eyes for another kiss.

Something had to be going on. Had he
been hexed? Had the universe turned itself inside out and nobody noticed but
him? Because this wasn’t normal. As the lips and
tongue turned their attention to his neck, which he appreciated even more than
the kissing, his mind seemed ready to implode. A hand crept down his stomach,
to a point in between his legs and began massaging. Okay, no, NOW his mind was
ready to implode. A groan escaped his lips. He felt betrayed by that. He wasn’t
enjoying this mentally…

Ron jerked
upright, covered in sweat, panting, and had an aching in his nether regions
which scared him more than the (he realised now it must have been) dream. The
curtains on his four-poster were pulled, thank Merlin. His breaths were
slowing, and the ache was fading. He gulped some air. What time was it? He
twitched back a curtain to look at the clock. Eight thirty in the morning… so
not only was he disturbed, he was late. He tried to run his fingers through his
hair as he was wont to do when he was stressed, but found it tangled and
dripping wet. From the stillness he sensed that the dormitory was empty. Good.
He didn’t fancy sharing his embarrassment with the rest of the room. He knew
his face was that fetching shade of beetroot red, he
put his fingers to his cheeks and felt the heat. The confusion continued to
fade as he realised that it was simply a dream. He couldn’t remember much as it
all slipped away from him, other than his romancer had been male, and that his
dream self had been grateful of the advances. And his physical self too, he
reasoned, remembering the erection. He blushed again. Male.
That was new. Plenty of filthy dreams floated through his subconscious every
night but never before had his partner in crime been male. He couldn’t quite
place how he felt about it. Either way, he knew he was going to be late if he
didn’t shift from the bed and into the shower. He’d have to go without breakfast,
but he didn’t feel hungry. He wasn’t feeling anything but rather numb, wondering
who the man was. He got up, floated across the floor and ended up in the shower
before he knew what he was doing. The water felt good.

His mind
kept drifting back to the dream. The skin was tingling where he remembered the
touch of the other man. He was starting to frown and worry, he knew it, without
even seeing his face or even really considering his thoughts. He didn’t know
what the dream really meant… did that mean he was gay? Or bisexual, considering
the rather spectacular dream the night before which contained more females than
any one man could handle? And was he okay with that, if it did? Did it even
mean that?

His hand
turned off the water and he dried himself. Just a dream, he told himself, and
took a deep breath. Just a dream. He couldn’t remember
what class he was meant to be in. He threw on his uniform and looked at the
timetable pinned up next to his bed. Potions. Fabulous. He knew that had been a bad idea two years ago
when he’d somehow scraped the grade to get into the NEWT level and had led
Hermione talk him into it as a ‘great idea’ and an ‘essential skill for the
future’. Within two weeks he’d known that to be utter twaddle, but had stuck at
it for her benefit because she didn’t want to be alone, Harry had stuck to his
guns and not been cajoled into two more years of torture. Ron wished he’d been
strong enough to agree with him.

He slung
his bag on his back and flew through Gryffindor
Tower like he had wings.
Down the staircases, jumping over the trick and missing steps as he had done
every day for seven years. The portraits watched with interest, some asked him
to slow down and some shouted to him that running was against the rules. After
seven years, there was one thing he knew –the rules at Hogwarts very rarely
applied, if you knew how to work your way out of them. And, being best friend
to Hogwarts’ premier trouble magnet, Ron knew just how to do that. So, slightly
out of breath, he arrived at the end of the Potions corridor quicker than he
should have, ready to join Hermione in the queue to be let in to the ritual
torture.

“Where were
you? Not like you to miss breakfast. I thought you simply couldn’t function if
you didn’t eat your own body weight in the morning?” She asked, not looking up
from the old, boring looking book she was reading.

“I must
have slept through my alarm, Harry didn’t wake me up,” he said, noting the
absence of the rumble that should have been in his stomach by now.

Hermione
gave him a disapproving look and said, “I’m not going to lecture you.”

“I kinda know it off by heart now anyways, so…” Ron shrugged
with a grin, and shifted the bag on his back.

Hermione
smiled and snapped the book shut, and shoved it into her crammed bag. Ron’s eyes
trailed over it and he said, “You know, that can’t be good for your posture.”

“Weightless
charm, works an absolute charm,” she winked, and Ron rolled his eyes.

“Should’ve known.”

“You
probably should have, yes,” she laughed, “After all these years.”

Everyone
seemed focussed on pointing out that this would all be over soon. Seven years
had gone by, and suddenly everyone seemed to be attaching the words ‘after all
these years’ to the end of every single sentence, as though the world was going
to end when school finished and they had to part ways. Ron didn’t really see
it. In fact he couldn’t wait. The friendships he had made here he knew he would
have for life, so, he wasn’t sad that school was going to end… the chance to
leave behind those who made a dent in his day, those who were nothing but
filler to him. To get out and concentrate on what was
important. He wasn’t exactly sure what the important stuff was yet, but
he assumed it would come to him on leaving. He hoped.

“Are you
okay, you look kind of distant?” Hermione asked, dragging him from his
thoughts. “Please wake up and pay attention. Don’t give him any excuse to take
points from us.”

“What, why
would I?” Ron said with mock annoyance. After all these years… dammit, now he was at it!

At that
point the door opened and the queue began to file in, not that it was that
long. Not many people were in the line, even if they got a good enough grade
(which Snape had been forced to lower by the Headmaster after Potions NEWT
intake went down to 2 the year they’d sat their OWLs)
there was still the fact that Potions was taught by Snape, and that alone was
enough to put people off in droves. Ron still couldn’t quite believe he was
doing it, and was nearing the end of it… and was still alive with minimal
cauldron wastage. It was a nice little boost to his ego, the thought, as he
made his way to their usual table and began pulling his kit out of his bag. The
class was settling around him, and Snape was waiting with a look of impatience
at the front, tapping his fingers on the wood of the desk. Ron glanced up to
look at him, and saw the Potions master delicately brush away some strands of
hair that had flopped over his eye.

There was a
pull in Ron’s stomach as that tiny every day action threw him headfirst back
into his dream. He recognised the raven hair now, the pale and cool skin, thin
lips. The tall and slender stature, powerful despite the seeming lack of
strength, pinning him the grass and the lips molesting his neck, hands
wandering. He took a sharp intake of breath. The man in his dream had been…

“Ron,
you’re staring,” Hermione hissed, “What’s the matter with you?”

“I, uh, erm…” Ron muttered, tearing his eyes away from his
professor, and gluing them to the book on the desk in front of him.

Hermione
was looking at him with worried eyes. “You look really pale, are you sure
you’re feeling alright?”

“I’m fine,”
Ron managed to sound a little more human with every word. “Just
hungry.”

Before he
could congratulate himself on his lovely save, Snape began to speak to the
class, and the tone of his voice floored Ron once again. Not that he could make
out the words, just the tone, the rise and fall of the syllables was keeping
him entranced. Never before had that voice sounded melodical,
like it had last night in the dream, like it did now. Normally it just sounded
harsh, impatient, a pissed-off-with-the-world bored drawl. But
no. It definitely sounded musical, even beautiful today. What the hell
was going on, and what was wrong with him!? His breaths were coming quickly again.

Up until that,
the fear of his dream hadn’t really taken over –he’d managed to keep it at bay.
Just a dream, he’d told himself, and he’d stuck to the mantra, repeating it.
But now that weak cover of protection had totally vanished with the revelation
that his mystery night time romancer was in fact someone he’d spent seven years
hating. What did that mean? He was harbouring secret feelings for his teacher?
That he’d gone completely insane? That someone had hexed him? Oh, that was
possible. Maybe someone had hexed him and the dream had been a joke, a big fat
joke. Who would do that, who could stand to create
such vivid intimacy for the detriment of another? Or, did he have the dream for
no reason other than the random quirks the dream world could throw up? He cast
his mind back to muggy lessons in the Divination tower, trying to remember what
they’d covered on dreams, but nothing was coming back… probably because he’d
spent the whole two years asleep. He cursed his attention span. He moved on to
pondering who he could surreptitiously ask, when the melodical
voice sent him crashing back to earth.

“Weasley!” Snape snapped, “Is there a staring
competition you’ve entered and forgotten to invite everyone else to?”

“Huh?” Ron
started, clapping his palms down flat on the desk and looking sideways to
Hermione, who was preparing her ingredients whilst staring back at him
worriedly.

“You’re not
doing anything,” Snape moved closer, and Ron had never before felt his body
react to someone’s proximity. “And you should be.”

“I-I’m
sorry, Professor,” he stammered, and pulled the nearest thing he could towards
him, which was unfortunately Hermione’s oh-so-flowery pencil case.

“That won’t help,” Snape smirked, placing one hand on his hip.

“Oh,” Ron
felt himself going red.

“The
elderflower extract,” Hermione whispered under her breath and nudged it with
her arm.

“As ever,
helping others when it’s not permitted,” Snape muttered and walked away. “Five
points from Gryffindor, as ever.”

Hermione’s
grip on her cutting knife sent her knuckles white and Ron knew better than to
whisper an apology, or he might find the knife embedded in his arm.

***

“You’ve
been acting weird all day,” Harry said matter-of-factly, lobbing his bag onto
his bed, where it promptly bounced and fell off the other side.

“I have
not,” Ron said, distracted, nudging his bag under the bed with his foot like he
always did.

“You have,
actually,” Neville piped up, coming out of the bathroom with dripping hair.
“You barely ate anything at lunch.”

“So my mood
is based around my eating pattern?”

“Yes.” They
both chorused it back at him like it was common knowledge. Maybe it was.

“Seriously,
what’s wrong?”

“Nothing!”

Harry exchanged
a glance with Neville, who shrugged, pulled on his jumper and left the room,
leaving Harry and Ron alone.

“Alright,
what’s happened?” he asked, sitting down on Ron’s bed and giving him a stern
look over the top of his glasses.

“Oh don’t
do that, you look like Hermione.”

“I know, that was the point.”

Ron rolled
his eyes and shrugged out of his robe, “Nothing’s happened,” he said from
within the material.

“Just tell me.”

Ron screwed
up the robe in a ball and threw it on top of his trunk at the end of his bed,
finally sitting down next to Harry. He didn’t really want to say anything. It
would be out of character to say anything. But his friends were intuitive
arseholes. They always had been. He really didn’t know what to say because he
was still in the process of convincing himself it was nothing at all… he wasn’t
up to explaining to anyone else yet.

“Okay. Do
you think our dreams mean something?”

“My kind of dreams where I see what’s actually happening, or the kind of
dreams where fluffy bunnies fly?”

“The kind with the bunnies, definitely.”

“No, I
really don’t. And if you asked me for a dream dictionary, I would beat you
round the head with it.”

“Good,” Ron
smiled. “Good.”

“Why, what
have you been dreaming about?”

“It’s
nothing,” he gave a dismissive shake of his head.

“It’s
something,” Harry disagreed, “Because you’ve been off with the bunnies all day
long. Nothing normally distracts you from food for that long, that’s for sure.”

Ron
shrugged, deciding that he wasn’t letting this one out of the bag.

“Oh, fine,
be all secretive. I’m going to dinner. You coming?”

In the
Great Hall, surrounded by the buzz of people eating and laughing, Ron found it
easier to stay with the present. Hermione was discussing Herbology
homework with Neville, and Harry was making pretty eyes at Ginny, a few seats
down. He shovelled in another forkful of dinner, a delicious steak and kidney
pie, and looked around the hall. Up at the teachers’ table, several of the
staff were eating. He let his eyes trail along until
he found a specific form, straight backed in their chair. Ron watched as the
other man ate, observing the silence which seemed to exude from his form.
Probably because he was such a miserable bastard that nobody wanted to talk to
him. Ron took another mouthful of pie and followed it with a whole new potato.
Such difference between the way they ate, Ron like a desperado, Snape so
delicately and primly. Why did he even care, why was he even watching? Ron
glued his eyes back onto his plate and finished his food. Everyone else was
still talking and he didn’t think they’d noticed his attention wander, for
which he was glad. All day long there’d been questions, asking if he was okay,
what was wrong, had something happened, telling him that he looked pale.

All this, just from a dream. A friggin’
dream. Ron couldn’t make sense of it all. Was this the way everyone reacted
when they had a dream about a member of the same sex who they’d see the next
day? Probably not. Everyone else probably didn’t stare
all day.  Ron stifled a yawn.

“Tired?” Hermione asked, turning to him. “I suppose you did chase those plants
round for two hours in Herbology.”

That had
been fun, not. Plants with legs, what an ingenious invention from nature! Not.
“They were pretty fast for little legs.”

“Faster
than you,” Harry snorted, and took a swig of pumpkin juice. “Has anyone thought
about that essay yet?”

“Oh, what,
you mean the stupidly long essay we were set when we should be revising for
exams?” Hermione growled, stabbing viciously at a sausage. “I’ve done it, but
I’m still angry about it.”

“You know
how you’re my very bestest friend in the whole wide
world?” Harry asked with big, wide eyes. “Would you let me look at it?”

“Hey!” Ron
said indignantly. “What about all that brotherhood shit? And suddenly she’s
your best friend in the world? And anyway, why don’t you want to look at my
essay?”

“Have you
done the essay?” Harry asked pointedly.

“Actually,
I bloody well have.”

Hermione
dropped her sausage. “What?”

“Yeah,
that’s shocked you, hasn’t it?” Ron nodded with an evil grin. “I work. Whoopdedoo.”

“What’s
happened to you?” Harry asked, aghast with horror. “Where’s Ron? What did you
do to him?”

Ron sniffed
the air affrontedly. “When will you learn, Harry, that for a quiet life,” he shot a sideways
glance at Hermione, “Sometimes it actually pays to do the work?”

“WHO ARE
YOU?!” Harry cried, throwing his hands up in dismay, but a grin was spreading
on his face.

“Master of
surprises, clearly,” Hermione said, and speared her sausage again. “Can I see
it?”

“You want
to see my work?” Ron asked, turning to her with an incredulous look on his
face.

“If you
don’t mind,” she shrugged.

“Well
that’s a turn up for the books,” Ron shook his head. “Who would have thought it.”

“After all
this time, I’ve rubbed off on you!” Her eyes actually welled up.

“Aaaaaargh if one more person says ‘after all this time’ I
am going to shove a kipper down their gullet!” Ron grumbled.

***

Ron had a
certain feeling of trepidation as the lights were extinguished that night in
the dormitory and each of his roommates’ breathing slowed as they fell asleep.
As he had been climbing in to bed, he suddenly wondered if the dream would
reoccur. The thought worried him. Surely, if it reoccurred, it meant something?

It was dark outside the window, he could see the stars when he peered out. He didn’t
recognise the room he was in. There was quiet outside the door, outside the
window, inside the room. Total peace. It was nice.
There was a fire with a squidgy sofa which looked so inviting he couldn’t
resist. As he sat down, he noticed the wine and the glasses. He didn’t really
like wine, but it was alcohol, so it was golden. He poured himself a drink,
thinking about the second glass. Was he expecting someone? Some recognition
dawned on him… oh yes, he was expecting someone. This didn’t feel strange,
though he had a recollection of it feeling strange before.

The door open and he smiled.
“Severus.” The name sounded alien on his lips, but not unpleasant.

“Hello,” Severus said with a small
smile, locking the door behind him, and sinking into the sofa with a small
groan.

“How was your day?”

“Okay… better for seeing you
though.”

Ron felt a definite sense of déjà
vu. “Mine too.”

Severus took a deep swig of wine and
let his head fall on the back of the sofa with his eyes closed. “I wish we
didn’t have to meet in secret,” he sighed, keeping them shut.

“Me too,” Ron heard himself say. He
felt like the talking was just beating around a bush and that they were
inevitably heading somewhere and the talking was just the precursor. Where,
though, he couldn’t pinpoint in his mind. Again, the feeling of being confused
before kept coming to him.

Next to him, Severus drained his
glass. “More.”

“You should slow down,” Ron said
reprovingly, before filling the glass again anyway.

“Shh.”
Severus turned to look at him. “It was a long day. Let me unwind.”

Ron kept his thoughts to himself,
and drank another sip himself. The smell of the room was washing over him,
warm, comforting; it smelt like winter in the castle. He could almost taste the
cinnamon in the air. Severus shifted closer to him and wrapped an arm around
his shoulders, pulling him nearer still.

“You smell nice,” Ron heard himself blurt out, and a small smile of recognition
fluttered around the other man’s lips.

They sat in silence a while,
silently drinking, looking at the flames in the grate flickering. Severus set
his glass by his feet and prised Ron’s from his hands and set that down too.

And then he was leaning into a kiss
whilst being held firm in arms with deceptive strength. The sense of déjà vu
returned to him. But there was no confusion. He brought his hands up and sunk
them into the raven hair and put more into the kiss. He felt his hands tremble
a little, a feeling which he then sensed was new.
Anticipation, he supposed.

“Are you okay?” Severus asked him,
looking concerned, “You’re shaking.”

“I’m fine,” the words tumbled out of
his mouth, as though he’d said them a thousand times that day already. “Just
anxious to spend time with you, I suppose.”

“But I’m here now,” Severus raised
an eyebrow.

“I know, I know,” Ron sighed.

Severus looked over his face and cocked
his head to one side. He kissed Ron gently on the forehead and pulled him into
a cuddle. “I forget that you’re younger. Not as assured.”

“I’m assured,” Ron said, and
realised how indignant he sounded.

“Really?” Severus asked wryly, “So that’s why you’re shaking?”

Ron threw his hand out in front of
them both and held it steady. “I’m not shaking”.

“I could make you shake,” Severus
said menacingly, and ducked to kiss the neck in front of him.

Ron laughed and tilted his head back,
revealing a pale, creamy throat. Severus took a moment to look at it. Ron liked
the way his eyes were gleaming slightly, as he though he were
hungry.

“Seriously, though…” Severus sat
back, “I do forget you’re younger… in your finest moments you’re more mature
than any thirty year old I know.”

Ron laughed. “I do so love it when
you compliment me by telling me I’m older than I actually am.” He rolled his
eyes.

Severus kissed him and whispered,
“You know I mean it in the right way.”

Ron leaned in for a kiss, but the
room flooded with light, and the feeling of confusion set in…

“Crap,” Ron
whispered, as he woke up, light stinging his eyes.

“Wake up,”
Harry said, yanking back the curtain to let even more light
in.

“I’m up.”

“You’re
vertical if not up,” Harry smirked, with a quick glance to the blankets. He
stalked back to his bed.

Ron felt
that should the floor open up and swallow him whole, his face flamed.

“It’s no
big deal, and if you think that’s the first time I’ve found you like that you’d
be sorely mistaken,” Harry winked, packing his bag up on his bed.

“Bastard.”

“I don’t
know who you were dreaming about-” Ron really hoped he’d not said a name “-but
you were really enjoying them, whoever they were.”

“Oh, yeah,”
Ron gave a sleepy lopsided smile. “I’m not going to deny that it wasn’t bad.”

Harry
laughed. “Dormitories… no privacy… can’t wait to get my own place. You’re going
to miss breakfast if you don’t get your head out of your arse, by the way”.

“Be there
in five minutes,” Ron muttered, dragging his hand across his eyes and struggling
to sit up. The pitched tent had thankfully disappeared.

He dressed
quickly and packed his bag. They had very few lessons, it was a Friday. Instead
it was filled with revision sessions, none of which he wanted to attend.

In the
Great Hall, he piled his plate high with scrambled eggs, sausages and beans.
His appetite appeared to have returned with gusto, which was good because it
would get everyone off his back asking what was wrong every five seconds. He
began to eat and half-heartedly listened in to a conversation that Harry was
holding with Seamus about a revision exercise neither of them had done. Ron
had. He didn’t volunteer the information, choosing instead to spend his time
wondering where he had found the inclination to actually do the work that
everyone else seemed to be ignoring. Normally he was the one doing the
ignoring.  His thoughts were disturbed by
a dark figure at the teachers’ table taking their place. Severus Snape sat and
filled a bowl with cornflakes, topped them with milk and began to eat, keeping
his eyes on a copy of The Daily Prophet next to his bowl. Ron continued to eat
as he watched him.

“So we
should probably work up a proper revision timetable, so that we can get on top
of Potions revision,” Hermione’s voice cut out of nowhere, and he turned to
her.

“Sorry, what?” He mumbled through a mouthful of sausage.

“Potions revision timetable, you up for it?”

“Yeah,
sure,” Ron waved a hand.

“Fun for you!” Harry said with sickening sweetness.

“Arse.”

Harry
laughed. “This is your own fault. If you’d not taken it, you wouldn’t have to
be revising it, would you?”

“Ignore him
Ron,” Hermione said, scowling at Harry who merely laughed. “I’ll draw it up, all you have to do is turn up to revise with me.”

“Hermione,
do you really think revising with me is going to be of any help to you?” Ron
asked lazily, wiping a slice of bread around his plate to catch the bean juice.

“Of course,
practice always helps!” She said, pouring some orange juice.

“I’m not
very intellectual though, as you’ve never failed to point out.”

“Still. It’s nice to have a revision partner, isn’t it?”

“If you say
so, and if you’re sure, I don’t want to fuck up your chances.”

“Don’t be
ridiculous,” Hermione sniffed, “You’re as competent as anybody in that class.”

Harry
choked on his food. “Are you serious? This is Ron!”

“HARRY!” Hermione hissed, glaring daggers
at him.

“Sorry,” he
swallowed. “That was a bit below the belt.”

“You hit my
ankles, you were so far below the belt,” Ron interjected, draining a glass.

“Well, I’m
not going anywhere near your belt after this morning,” Harry smiled
beatifically, waiting for a retaliation.

“What
happened this morning?” Hermione looked between them curiously.

“Nothing,”
Ron said grumpily, “Harry’s being immature and
disgusting.”

“Hey, I’m
not the one who woke up with a boner the size of-”

“Shut up!” Ron hissed desperately, “Shut
your face up right this second.”

Hermione
had gone a little red. So Ron went red, and Harry simply sat trying to suppress
his laughter and failing.

“You are so
dead,” Ron hissed, snatching his bag up. “So dead.” He
walked away from the table with his cheeks aflame.

“Harry,
that wasn’t necessary,” Hermione said with a stare. “So what if you found him… errr, you know. It’s natural.”

“I was just
teasing, there was no reason for him to get so het up
about it?” Harry looked after Ron, feeling confused.

“He’s
sensitive.”

“Right.”

“You know
what he’s like. He bottles everything up inside and is very private. He’s
probably mortified that you… well.”

“Oh fine.
I’ll apologise later. And, I will not tell you the very interesting thing I
heard him say when he was asleep and presumably dreaming about the thing which
caused me to find him in that state in the first place.”

“I don’t
want to know, so it’s good you’ve decided to keep it to yourself.”

“Even if it was about you? You wouldn’t want to know, really?”

“Seriously, Harry, have you morphed into a 13 year old girl and none of us
noticed?”

“Honestly
and truly you’re telling me that if someone was having a sexual dream about you
and someone else heard, you wouldn’t want them to tell you if the person that
had the dream was someone you really
liked?”

“I do not really like Ron.”

“Yeah,
right, okay.”

“Harry-”­

“No, you
know, it’s fine. You don’t want to know, I get it.” Harry held his hands up in
surrender and finished his juice.

Hermione
bit her lip, curiosity washing over her in an uncharacteristic wave. “What did
you hear?”

“I knew you
wanted to know.”

“Harry.”

“Well, I
feel kind of shit now, because after all that, it wasn’t your name that I
heard.”

“Oh.”

“Sorry.”

“So… who
was it?”

Harry
looked uncomfortable. She could see he hadn’t really been going to tell her
anyway. “Well, I don’t know…”

Hermione
leaned closer, “Someone embarrassing?”

“I think
Ron would find it pretty embarrassing, yeah.”

“Someone in our house?”

“Not in any
house at all.”

“Ooh,
someone older?” She gasped, “A teacher?”

“Bingo.”

Hermione’s
head instantly swivelled to the teachers’ table at the front of the hall. They
were a motley array of the human race… and none were there which she would
think were attractive. Unless….

“Male or female?”

Harry
didn’t answer, but bit his lip in his tell-tale nervous ‘I-shouldn’t-really-be-saying-this’
way.

“Male?” she
half whispered, half gasped. Somewhere, deep inside, a little
part of her crunched.

Harry
nodded, feeling guilty, watching Hermione’s head scan the table again.

“Ohhhh my goodness,” she gasped, and he knew she’d
figured it out. “That explains why yesterday in Potions he was being so weird.”

“Weird?”

“Yeah,
staring into space, not paying attention… and he was like it all day, remember,
not eating and stuff?”

Harry
nodded. “He asked me yesterday if I thought our dreams meant something.”

“Your
dreams mean something, oh Merlin, what did you say to him?”

“I told him
my dreams meant something but dreams with bunnies didn’t and I’d hit him round
the head with a dream dictionary if he asked me for one.”

“Oh, thank
heavens. He’s probably a bit confused. Do you think this has been going on
long?”

“No,” Harry
shook his head conspiratorially, “He’s only been odd since yesterday.”

“We
shouldn’t say anything. Not unless he continues to be odd. It’s his business.”

“Agreed.
It’s weird though, why is he dreaming about Snape?”

Hermione
shrugged, “I really don’t know. Do you think he’s….”

“I don’t
know, is that what it means?”

“Have you
ever, you know… dreamt about another man?”

Harry
choked. “Erm. Do I want to
answer that? Not around the breakfast table,” he hissed.

“So that’s
a yes then?”

“Maybe.”

“Oooh, who?”

“Shut up. Now.”

“Alright then. I think I know though.”

“You know
nothing.”

“I know
many things.”

“You didn’t
know this was going to happen with Ron,” Harry shot back, and instantly felt
rude. “I’m sorry. This must be quite… hard for you.”

Hermione
said nothing, but became very interested with her bag.

“I’m
sorry,” Harry repeated. “We don’t know anything yet. It might be nothing. And
you still might be able to marry him and have lots and lots of babies.”

“Harry,”
she muttered, blushing a little. “I don’t want Ron’s
babies.”

“I don’t
know much, Hermione, but I know a liar when I see one, because I’ve done my
fair share of lying. You’re lying. I know it, you know it, Ron
probably knows it. I thought he returned the feeling. Who knows?”

She looked
at him a little desperately, and he hated it when she made that face. It was
her on the verge of tears face. “Come on, we’re done here,” he picked up his
bag, and herded her outside.

They walked
towards the Transfiguration classroom in silence. Harry knew in the next
corridor there was a quite alcove hidden by a tapestry, and as they passed,
grabbed her arm, and pulled her behind it.

“Sit. Cry.
Here’s a tissue,” he commanded, sitting her down on the bay window.

“I don’t-”
she protested, eyes watering.

“Tissue!”
Harry said firmly, waving it her.

She grabbed
it reluctantly and dabbed at her eyes and blew her nose. Harry put an arm about
her shoulders and shook her gently. “Come on. We don’t know anything.”

Hermione
nodded. “I know. I don’t know why I’m being so silly. Must be
PMT or something.”

“Hopefully,”
Harry said with a grin. “We’re going to be late. Now.
Would you like me to take the seat in between you?”

“When did
you get all considerate?” Hermione asked in dismay. “It’s amazing. You turned
considerate and Ron turned intellectual. World’s gone mad.”

“I’m
offended, I’ve always been considerate,” Harry complained, pulling back the
tapestry.

“Seven
years of Quidditch matches and not once have you ever
taken the time to explain to me why it’s so important,” Hermione niggled,
“That’s not considerate.”

She pulled
open the door to the Transfiguration classroom.

“Chocolates on your birthday. I’d call that considerate.”

“But that
was my birthday, it doesn’t count.”

“It totally
counts.”

“Whether it
counts or not is irrelevant; Potter, Granger, you’re late. Sit down and be
quiet,” McGonagall said snappily, paused at the board with chalk in her hand.

“Sorry
Professor,” Harry muttered, and threw himself into the empty seat next to Ron,
leaving the one on his left free for Hermione.

“Sorry,”
she murmured faintly, and going pink. Hermione Granger was not normally late
for things.

“Where were
you?” Ron whispered to Harry as soon as McGonagall had set the class to
revising the spells that they had covered in their sixth year. In his hand he
held a pretty white rat with pink eyes, he was tickling her behind her ear, and
she was grinding her teeth happily.

“Got held
up, we were talking,” Harry replied, unlatching the lock on his own rat.

“You’re so
cute, yes you are!” Ron cooed, lifting the rat up to eye level and stroking her
head. “I almost don’t want to transfigure her, in case something goes wrong.
I’d feel mean!”

“Well, get
it right and nothing will happen to the rat, Weasley,”
McGonagall said, having overheard his comment. “Lesson
learned and such.”

Ron set the
rat on his desk, picked up his wand, said the incantation, and turned the rat
into a teacup. With another wave of the wand the rat was back, blinking at him
suspiciously, swaying from side to side.

“See, she’s
upset,” Ron muttered, picking the rat up and holding it close to his body.
Although he had never gotten over the betrayal of his old rat, Scabbers, actually being the animagus
form of a traitor, he still held a fascination and love of the teeny animals
which were so loving. He placed the rat back in her
cage and locked her in, where she began to nest.

“They’re
well looked after Weasley.”

“Yeah, and
fed to Hagrid’s menagerie when they snuff it,” Ron
retorted derisively, forgetting to whom he was speaking. He winced
waiting for the rebuttal.

But
McGonagall merely shrugged, “The world goes on, Weasley,
waste not, I suppose, even If it is grisly.”

She walked
away to survey the other students. Harry’s teacup
turned back into a rat.

“Hermione
looks a bit… upset,” Ron said, peering round Harry’s
form. “Is everything okay, is that why you were late?”

“She’s…
she’s fine. I’ll talk to you later. We need to talk,” Harry looked at him.

“Why?”

“We just
do.”

“Is this
about this morning?”

“No. Yes.
No. Maybe.”

“What about
this morning, surely you’ve seen one before?” Ron raised his eyebrow.

“Oh, shut up. It’s not about that particular part.”

“There was
something else?”

“Yeah, you
said something in your sleep, and I think we need to talk about it. OW!”

Ron’s eyes
flew up and Harry was rubbing his leg, the one nearest to Hermione. Ron
suspected Hermione had just kicked him.

So she knew
too. But what did they both know? Waking up with an erection wasn’t an arrestable offence. Harry might think so if he knew the
instigator of it, mind…. Ron’s hand suddenly gripped the edge of the table.
That was it. He must have said Snape’s name in his
sleep, and Harry had seen him in the morning and made the connection. Well. He
would just deny it. And hope Hermione wasn’t going to get all observant about
the Potions lesson the day before. Yes, denial would work, or say maybe he had
said the name aloud but that certainly wasn’t who the dream was about. Yes,
he’d say that. Perfect.

So why was he still worried?

***

The
conversation wasn’t going well.

“I’m afraid
your son isn’t performing well in any of his lessons. That’s probably because
he’s not turning up to them,” Severus Snape said, running a quill between his
fingers.

The boy in
question shifted nervously in his seat, and his parents stared back blankly. Slytherins never took this kind of news well. “His
consistent truancy and diminishing results are the reason I asked for this
meeting to be arranged. Hogwarts does give its pupils a fair amount of leniency
and time before deciding that further action has to be taken. Your son’s results
have been poor for two consecutive years.”

Still
nothing from either parent, the boy sat scuffing his shoe on the floor as if he
thought it would help him cope better.

“We need to
discuss your son’s progress and whether he needs any extra help.”

“Extra help?” The mother finally spoke, “What, do you think he’s thick or something?”

Severus
tried to ignore the positively evil glare she’d shot her son at the moment.
“No, I am not doubting his mental competence, I’m
saying we need to get to the bottom of why he feels the need to skip lessons,
which is making his performance suffer.”

“Bunking
off lessons never caused me any harm,” the father piped up, straightening his
suit jacket with Ministry crest.

“I’m glad
to hear that,” Snape replied somewhat acerbically, “But it doesn’t appear to be
going particularly well for your son.”

“So what do
you suggest?” The mother snapped.

“Well, the
usual timesheets, he has to get them signed daily and if he fails there are
punishments, and if it continues, we’d have no choice but to question whether
he was worthy of his school place.”

“You can’t
do that, you have to teach everybody here!” The father
protested, sitting up straight and paying attention for the first time since
he’d entered the room.

“Well, we
want to teach everybody. So we’d appreciate a little effort, Xavier. Do you
think you’ll be able to co-operate.” Severus said with a forced smiled which
looked more like a grimace.

The boy
nodded, Severus suspected just to get himself out of this meeting sooner.
Severus couldn’t blame him, either.

“Then I
think we’re done here. Thank you for your time.”

“You could
have done this by letter, you know,” the woman said pointedly, gathering her
expensive coat around her shoulders.

Severus
stood and drew himself up to his fullest height, “I tried, madam. You chose not
to reply to my letters.”

He crossed
the room, and opened his office door then stood back for them to file out. He
shut the door and lingered, waiting to hear what was said in the hallway.

“We’ll see
you in a few months,” the mother said sharply, “Make sure you pull yourself
together, I don’t like this dump but seeing as Durmstrang
wouldn’t take you, and it’s all you’ve got… I repeat. Pull yourself together.”

Severus
heard her heels clacking on the cement as she walked away, and heard the
shuffling footsteps of Xavier back towards the Slytherin
dormitories.

“Well that
was a waste of time,” he muttered to himself as he sat back down behind his
desk.

He
carefully filed away all of the paperwork relating to the meeting. He ran his
hands through his hair. Drummed his fingers on the wood of
the desk. He had expected the meeting to go on for longer, and now he
had extra empty space spanning out across the evening. Just
what he needed. More time on his hands, as if he didn’t have enough of
it already, too much in fact. It was a nice evening outside,
maybe he’d pay the village a visit.

***

“SO, you
ready for this talk?” Harry said, sitting down on Ron’s bed.

“No,” Ron
said distantly, closing the book he was pretending to read.

“Come on.”

“Look, I
don’t know what this is about,” Ron said, getting uncomfortable.

“This
morning before I woke you up, you said someone’s name, and it was a bit of an
unusual name to say considering the state I found you in.”

“Whose name
did I say?” Ron asked calmly, amazed at his control.

“Well-”

“Harry,
come on, Quidditch, it’s still light out. I love it
when the nights draw out!” Dean exclaimed, bursting into the room, dropping to
his knees and rummaging under his bed for his shin pads.

“I’ll be
there in a minute, just give me a second…” Harry said, “I’ll see you down at
the pitch.”

“Alright,”
Dean said enthusiastically, checking he had both pads, and leaving the room
again.

When his
footsteps had become quiet enough, Harry continued.

“I heard
you say a man’s name.”

“What man?”

“You know
what man!”

“I don’t
know.”

“Ron, for
Merlin’s sake, you’re making this harder.”

“Oh, this
is hard for you? This incredibly weird conversation which YOU
instigated?” Ron jumped up, pointing at Harry.

“Oh, fine.
I heard you say Snape’s name.”

“Right.”

“Except you
weren’t saying it, you were moaning it. Good moaning.”

Ron felt
the heat rise, there went his ‘denying it’ plan. If he had moaned the name then
it obviously implied that the dream was more than just your usual dream. Damn.

Harry was
staring at him expectantly.

“What do
you want me to say?” Ron asked finally.

“Explain!”

“What is
there to explain? You heard something you weren’t meant to hear, that nobody
was meant to hear, and that I didn’t even know that I was thinking. That’s
all.”

“Are you
sure it’s all? You’re not suddenly harbouring same sex tendencies and are
carrying a massive torch for our disgusting Potions Master?”

“He’s not
disgusting.” The words were out before he could stop them.

“Oh my God.
I didn’t believe it, I didn’t believe it until you just said it.”

“Harry. Seriously. Stop.”

“This is
huge.”

“It’s
nothing.”

“Really?”

“Please
stop it.” Ron sat down on his bed and leant against a bed post. “I really don’t
know what’s happening and you’re just making things worse.”

Harry
studied him for a moment and said, “Sorry.”

Ron nodded.

“When did
this start?”

“Night before last.”

“You’ve had
more than one?”

Ron nodded.
“It’s why I asked you about dreams.”

“I figured
as much.”

Silence
fell. “So Hermione knows about this? And she was upset?”

“Yeah… I’m
sorry. It just kind of happened.”

“She was
upset because she thinks I might be gay?”

“Are you?”

“Do I look
like a person in the know, Harry?” Ron asked warily, and exasperatedly tilted
his head to one side.

“Guess not,”
Harry chuckled.

“Can we end
this conversation now?”

“I’m not
done.”

“Yes you
are.”

Harry
coolly stared at Ron. “I get you’re not the sharing type, especially not with
me, and about something like this. But you’re clearly a bit freaked out by it. As am I, by the way. If you want an ear, I’m here, it’s all I’m saying. You don’t have to push us away
because you think it’s too weird to talk about. If I had done
that… for seven years (please don’t push a kipper down my gullet), then would I
ever have said a word to anyone? No. Everything about me is weird, all
the stuff we’ve done, is weird. This is no weirder than any of it, I promise
you. Now. I’m going to go and play some Quidditch before the light fades.”

And he
stood up, gave Ron a smile, and left. Ron groaned and fell back on to his bed.
Tiredness was tugging at his eyes, but yet once again he felt somewhat
reluctant to go to sleep. Except, tonight, there was something else next to the
reluctance… eagerness. This alone scared him more than anything the dream world
could throw up. He was actually eager to fall asleep and enter the dream world
and what it held for him in the first place. He felt stupid. It was only half
past six, a Friday night. He wasn’t going to work. But he wasn’t going to crawl
between the sheets at this early hour to enter something he was afraid of. He
stood up and stretched, feeling his spine lengthen as he did so.

Seventh
years were allowed out on Friday and Saturday nights, they could go to the
village. It was warm out, he wouldn’t need a jacket. He proceeded down through
the tower, all the way to the entrance hall. He signed his name on the list
next to the door, not many people had left… he supposed they were all
virtuously revising. Being virtuous was hard work and he’d had enough. Setting
off into the warm evening air, he kept his eyes on the path. He didn’t want to
be grabbed by Harry for Quidditch, or anyone else for
that matter.

His
thoughts turned instantly to his dreams again. Once more he felt his skin
tingle when he thought about where he’d been touched in the dreams. It was so
strange. And he found even stranger that he didn’t mind. It didn’t make him run
screaming for the hills. It was bizarre. It was the sort of tenderness he
wasn’t used to, the loving touches and the feeling of contentedness. Maybe that
was why he kept returning to the thoughts, they subconsciously made him happy.

He entered Hogsmeade in no time at all, his long legs carrying him
there faster than he realised. The village was winding down, except for the
restaurants which were starting to open, people were sitting outside, talking,
chatting. Ron followed his feet to The Three Broomsticks, a regularly beaten
path. He opened the door and the little bell tinkled. The pub was buzzing with
noise, he supposed people enjoying the end of a working week. He made his way
to the bar and ordered a firewhiskey with lemonade
from Madam Rosmerta; usually he always found her extremely
attractive. Her prominent breasts in a low cut top helped. But not tonight, he
noticed. She smiled her usual smile at him as she pushed his drink and bag of
peanuts across the slightly sticky bar.

“All alone tonight? That’s unusual for you,” she
commented, as she sorted out his change in the till.

“Felt like
some peace and quiet,” he smiled, hopefully convincingly, “And everyone’s
really busy with exam preparation.”

“Shouldn’t
you be, darling?”

“Everyone
needs a break now and then. It’s Friday night. Why break the habit of a
lifetime?” he winked at her, to which she laughed.

“Too true, darling. You’ll go mad staring at books all day long. Enjoy your
night, love.”

Darling, love. Words which used to send him red about the ears when
she said them, making him wonder if such a beautiful well endowed woman could
ever appreciate a geeky, lanky ginger beanpole such as himself. Tonight
those thoughts were absent, and it made him feel discomfited.

He made his
way to a quiet, dim corner and settled himself in. He pulled a paper from the
rack on the wall and began to read the front page of the prophet, helping
himself to peanuts as he went. The paper wasn’t very interesting, but it was a
welcome distraction. Ministry gumpf, The Weird
Sisters might be breaking up, price of butterbeer
going up whilst the cost of beetle shells was going down… blah blah blah. Bored quickly, Ron
folded the paper up and pushed it to the end of the table and focussed on
tracing his finger over the patterns in the wood instead. He took a swig of firewhiskey and shuddered as it torched its way down. The
warming glow in his stomach made him think back to his dreams. He ate a few
more peanuts, finishing the bag. He licked his finger and wiped it over the
inside of the bag, collecting the salt. He raised it to his lips and sucked the
salt from his skin, relishing the taste. The door to the pub tinkled in the
distance, high above the chatter of the patrons. He didn’t bother to look up, he didn’t want to be bothered. The salt tingled on his tongue, he really loved that sensation and the taste. It
made him want more peanuts. He chucked back the last of the firewhiskey
and rummaged in his pocket for change. He would have to switch onto something cheaper.

He pushed
back his chair and moved to the bar, which was empty except for a figure
sitting on stool at the opposite end.

“Back for
more already, you’re not going to get drunk are you?” Rosmerta
teased with a grin.

“Heh, no,” Ron smiled. “I’m poor, so I’ll switch to a butterbeer for now, thanks, and some more nuts.”

“Good for
you, get your fill before the bastards put the price up,” she said sourly,
popping off the bottle top and bending down to rummage for the peanuts.

Once again,
it was a view that Ron should have enjoyed. And he wasn’t conceding that he was
totally uninterested… it was a nice view.

“Here you
are,” she straightened up. As she took his money, she glanced at him, “You look
a little without it tonight. One firewhiskey can’t
have done that. What’s the matter?”

Ron shook
his head, “Nothing.”

Rosmerta
put her hands on her hips and shook her head at him in return. “Liar. I’ve seen every single one of your brothers come
through here and you all get the same look about you when something’s wrong.
Don’t think I know, I know everything,” she tapped her nose.

Ron
laughed. “Nothing serious then, how’s that?”

“Well if
it’s got you down then it’s serious.”

“Honestly,
I’m fine. I’m going to go and sit down now,” he waved the bottle at her and
excused himself, but dropped the bag of peanuts on the floor.

Tutting,
he turned to bend and pick them up, but saw that the person sat on the stool
was already there, a pale hand stretching out, grabbing the bag, and turning
their glance upward to hand the to their owner.

“Weasley,” Snape said curtly, “You dropped this.”

A million
replies were exploding within Ron’s mind. He couldn’t decide which one to pick.
He didn’t know what to do, his body felt electrified and he himself was rooted
to the spot. Severus glanced and him, then held his hand out further, “They are
yours, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” Ron
coughed a little. “Thank you.”

He took
them gently and tried a smile, which he knew came out looking like a grimace.
Either way, he didn’t think Snape noticed, he was
already looking away before the bag was lifted from his hand. He didn’t notice
how carefully Ron aimed his fingers, so that their skin shouldn’t chance to
touch, so that he could leave his proximity quicker. Ron turned again,
clutching both the drink and the offending nuts, and was just about to move
when Snape spoke.

“Weasley, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that last
essay you submitted.”

He froze,
the sound of his surname in that melodical tone sent
shivers down his spine. He really didn’t like the way this was going, it wasn’t
going the way he wanted at all.

“Yes, sir?”
he asked quietly, turning round.

Snape
pointed to the stool next to him. Ron sat like an obedient dog. At that moment
he realised, quite nervously, he probably would have done anything Snape asked
him to do.

Snape took
a sip of his drink, whilst Ron tried to peel his eyes away from his throat… it
moved just the way it did in his dreams, the lips were the same... everything
was the same as the dreams.

“Did
Granger write it for you?”

Ron wasn’t
so far gone that he couldn’t be insulted by a dig, however. “No, I wrote it!”
he exclaimed, sitting up straight.

Severus
surveyed him for a moment, as if weighing up from a glance at his face whether to believe him or not. “Okay. In which case,
then, I should congratulate you. It was… much improved from the standard of the
work from a few years ago.”

Wow.
Stunned, Ron set down his drink, and mumbled, “Oh, thank you.”

“One of the best in the class. And I hate saying that so I wouldn’t be saying it if it
wasn’t true.”

Ron nodded
and couldn’t help a little grin.

“I had a
lecture prepared, I fully expected you to say to got
Granger to contribute. Now I have nothing to fill the time with,” he said
wryly, “So, you might as well go back to your table.”

Dismissed,
just like that. Ron couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed, but then he
chided himself for it. He had no right to be disappointed, because there was
nothing going on. Severus knew nothing of his dreams, didn’t know the feelings
that were starting to grow and be harboured in Ron’s chest. Even Ron didn’t
really know what they were or if he wanted them to stay. He slumped back down
in the chair lost in his thoughts. He thought what the compliments meant to
him. He liked it, he liked being praised by anyone… but did it matter more
because of the dreams, because that person was so unbelievably hard to impress?
He guessed so. He didn’t like that it meant more because of the dreams, which
he’d never asked for, and didn’t know if he was enjoying them.

Then he
remembered the pang, way back on his bed, where he had been eager to fall
asleep and see what his Professor would do to him in his mind that night. That
eagerness might be telltale of the fact that actually, Ron was rather enjoying it. He took a gulp of butterbeer.
He’d singularly never been so confused, not even when McGonagall had pulled
those complex equations out in their sixth year exam paper. He’d winged it
then, and surprised himself by gaining enough marks to continue to the next
year. But this… how could he wing this? Be normal by day and go to bed with a
man in his head at night? That was insane. Maybe he was insane. He pondered
this thought with another mouthful of butterbeer and
he tore open the packet of peanuts. Maybe that was it… there was something in
his head that was causing the dreams and it wasn’t his subconscious at all. But
as he chewed, he realised that if he went with that line of explanation, the
dreams could go as soon as they had come, and then where would that leave him,
should he become accustomed to them?

Confusion
reigned supreme. He squeezed his eyes shut. On opening them again the world was
no different. He kept one hand around his glass and rested his chin on his
other arm. His eyes fell on the professor at the bar,
he knew there was little other point in trying to train them elsewhere. The
stiff posture, one thin hand on the glass of red wine (something else Ron noted
that was the same as the dream). The man’s bored expression and deep eyes. The
nose, regrettably shaped, was the prominent feature of his face, but without
it, his face would have looked strange… odd. His nose made him much more
masculine, even if it was unfortunately sized. It was hard to see his lips from
so far away, but Ron knew them anyway, as if he’d looked over them a thousand
times. And with a small smile, he remembered what it felt like to have them on
his own fuller lips, to have the thin but long hands spread across his waist
and then reach down, teasing him, smiling, causing him to groan in frustration.
Ron had to shift in his seat then, he was reacting in a way which was
embarrassing in public. And this was new again, he was no longer asleep, he was
awake… but daydreaming sexually about his teacher. Surely there were laws about
this…. Or if there weren’t there really should be. An alarming image of himself spread eagled over a desk came to mind, maybe it was
coincidence that at that moment, Severus Snape turned his head in his
direction. It was so dark in his corner of the pub that Ron couldn’t tell
whether he was actually looking at him, or looking in that direction. Either
way, emboldened by his one and a half drinks, Ron didn’t stop looking back, he simply looked on, trying to keep the desk image
from his mind. He blinked a few times, and each time the room came back into
view, Severus Snape was still looking in his direction.

Ron was actually quite thrilled by this, he was surprised to learn. The thought
of him looking over made him tingly. How
pathetic are you? His brain asked of him, but Ron refused to answer it, and
kept on looking. He took a mouthful of drink. Still the other man did not look
away. Instead, with a movement that caused his heart to leap into his mouth,
Severus Snape got up, picked up his drink, and moved towards him…

***

Severus was
a little confused. Ron Weasley had been staring at
him for ten whole minutes, with a far off look in his eyes. Around him, the pub
was getting busier. Sooner or later, someone would come and take the seats
between his body and Ron’s line of sight. He couldn’t quite figure out why he
would be staring. Was he just staring in his general direction? It agitated him
not to know. He really didn’t like being stared at. His line of sight was
clear, he knew what he could do to find out what was on the younger man’s mind…
turning his head, he wordlessly cast a legilimens spell, and bore his eyes into Ron’s. The flood
of images which flashed into his mind were confusing.
They were all of his face, his body, his hands, his drink, and then the memory
of Ron pouring wine, handing it to him, watching him drink in a room Severus
had never seen; Ron’s focus switched primarily to his throat as it moved during
swallowing. And then… Severus could hardly believe what he was seeing, the
image of them entwined, his own hands smoothing over a waist, kissing, the
smell of the room, cinnamon –like Christmas, and then hands slipping further
down the body.

With a
jolt, Severus broke off the spell. He sat stunned for a few seconds before
gathering his composure. He picked up his drink and stood, and moved towards
Ron. He saw the lift in the young man’s eyebrows, and the confused hope in his
eyes. He knew Ron had absolutely no idea he’d just been ‘mind spied’. Weak minds… Severus thought with
distaste. It happened to so many people and they didn’t know, they’d never
know. He was getting closer to Ron’s table and didn’t really have any idea what
to say. ‘Hello, I just dropped into your
mind and saw us getting ready to fuck… that was interesting, wasn’t it?’

No, he
certainly couldn’t say that. But what would he say? And if he had nothing to
say, why on earth was he still moving towards the damned table? But before it
was too late to turn away, his thigh bumped into the wood of the table and he
had arrived. He pulled out the spare chair, and sat. Ron looked at him with
eyes betraying his inner emotions.

Coolly, he
spoke, “Professor, is there something I can help you with?
More proof I write my own work, perhaps?”

Actually you can help me by
explaining what the f- “Well, you seemed to be looking in my direction for an awfully long
time Weasley, it made me wonder if you were trying to
get my attention.”

“No, Sir.”

“Well then,
did your mother never tell you it was rude to stare?”

“She did,
but then I grew up with five brothers and listening to your mother is never
really a priority in those sorts of situations,” he shot a grin at Severus.

“Right.” Bollocks. Now what? Sat here like a
fruitcake. Smooth, oh so smooth.

“Is there
anything I can help you with?” Ron repeated, as though he thought it were a
good phrase to repeat.

Stop asking me what you can help
with… if you knew what you could help me with, we wouldn’t be here, that’s for
sure! “Well, now
I’m here, I was just going to ask if you’d finished with your copy of the Prophet?”

“This?” Ron
asked, indicating to the folded newspaper. “I haven’t even gotten round to
reading it yet, but you can take it if you’d like.”

You little liar. “Never
mind, I’ll, er, see if I can find another.”

Severus got
up to leave, and again Ron’s eyes gave him away. He didn’t want him to go.
Unable to help himself, Severus’ cruel streak broke through. He had seen Ron Weasley blush and storm off several times in his seven
years at Hogwarts, and he couldn’t resist the opportunity that Ron had so
willingly handed him on a plate. He moved over slightly, and bent down so he
was at the level of his ear.

“I know
what you’re thinking. You might want to know that your face is a little
transparent and it gives you away, you look like an excited puppy.” He made
sure he breathed extra warmly into his ear as he spoke, and noticed a shudder. Cruel, yes -but at the same time also immensely satisfying.

He straightened
and Ron’s face paled and his eyes widened. “You know?”

Severus
gave a curt nod and tipped the last of his wine down his throat, making sure to
expose it slowly and swallow sumptuously. He was enjoying this, he didn’t know
why. Normally student infatuations bored him. Maybe because he’d never seen the
thoughts of those students, they’d never been so colourful in his mind. “Good
night, Mr. Weasley.”

Ron sank
back into his chair and watched as the older man left the pub. He knew? How?
And how long had he known? Did he mean he knew about the dreams or about the
less than angelic thoughts Ron had been having until the point that he had
stood up and come over? He had a niggling thought that Severus Snape could
probably perform wordless legilimens spells. This
thought filled him with rage, how dare he intrude on his thoughts like that?! You were staring at him!

Ron tipped
the last of his butter beer down his throat and threw his chair back. He
stormed out into the street, which was lit with the last of the light from the
setting sun. It was very beautiful, the pavement was a golden orange but in his
impatience he didn’t take it in. His eyes scanned the street for a retreating
back, and set off towards Hogwarts at a jog. He rounded the corner onto the
single track road at the end of the village, and stopped dead as he saw the
retreating back he was actually looking for, that he’d given up hope on, that
he thought had just apparated back to the castle
gates. He put on a last spurt and jogged up to the man.

“Excuse
me,” he said, trying to still his breath whilst settling into a walking pace.
“What exactly do you mean, ‘I know’?”

“I know
many things,” Severus tried to remain cool and collected.

Ron threw
out a hand and grabbed the other man’s arm, stopping his pace. “Tell me what
you know.”

“Get your
hands off me,” Severus laughed, shaking out of Ron’s grip. But he didn’t walk away, he looked at the redhead who was squinting in the
sunlight.

“I just… I
would just like to know what it is you think you know,” Ron said.

“I know
what you were thinking in the pub, what you were remembering.” Severus said
simply, realising Weasley wasn’t going to let his
little game continue, he was too savvy for that.

Ron
surpassed the colour red. “How fucking dare you,” he half-growled, shocking himself at the anger
in the tone.

“You were
staring at me for ten minutes, I thought you might be mentally ill, so I had a
little look in your mind to check everything was alright,” he struggled to keep
a straight face.

“Well,
didn’t YOUR mother ever tell you it was rude to intrude on other people’s
private thoughts!?” Ron hissed and placed both of his hands on his hips.

His hips.
Did that mean that Severus had seen his memory of the dream, and seen how he’d
slid his own hands over those hips and further down to the groin beyond? Ron
finally knew what it felt like to actually want to combust. When he raised his
eyes from the dirt he saw that Severus, too, was looking at his hips.

“Oh God,”
Ron lost it, and turned around, stomping towards the trees lining the road, his
face in his hands. “Oh my fucking God.”

“Your
language is appalling, Weasley.” Severus’ voice came
from behind him.

Ron stepped
back in surprise and walked straight into Severus’ tall form.

He gasped, his back a-tingle from where contact had been made.

“You need
to calm down,” Severus said softly. He placed his hands on Ron’s upper arms,
and pulled his hands away from his face. “Calm down.”

“But you
saw the dreams,” Ron muttered, disgusted with his childlike demeanour.

“Is that
what they were, dreams?” Severus asked softly, not lifting his grip. “Thank
God, I did rather wonder if I’d had sex with a student and totally not
remembered it.”

“Don’t
worry, sir, I’m pretty sure you’d remember me if we had,” Ron said before he
could stop himself.

Severus
couldn’t help himself, he laughed. “Well, I’ll keep that in mind. When did
these dreams start?”

“Night before last. I was so confused,” he admitted, shaking his head, “And now
they appear to be turning into actual daydreams, which is
just wonderful.”

“You don’t
enjoy dreaming about me?” Severus asked, slightly affronted despite himself.

Ron stared at him levelly. “Okay, you’re me, you’re 18 years old. You’re a
Gryffindor, one night you have a dream about your Potions teacher,
and you really rather like it. It happens again. And then you find yourself
wanting to go to sleep because you’d like to have yet another dream. And then
you get confused about that, and the teacher invades on your private thoughts
one night when you’re having an innocent drink and sees all the filthy thoughts.
How would you feel?”

Severus
released Ron’s arms. “Yes, I see your point,” he conceded, and rubbed the
stubble growing on his chin.

“So… what now?” Ron asked somewhat miserably.

“Well, you
go back to your dormitory, and you fall asleep,” Severus said softly. “If
that’s what you want. And if you don’t, there are dreamless sleep potions.”

“Oh.”

“Is that
not what you wanted to hear?”

“Are you
not… did what you saw in my mind not interest you?”

“If it did,
I couldn’t act on it. You’re too young, and you’re my student. It’s fifty kinds
of wrong and I would lose my job if anyone found out.”

“Right,”
Ron said. Severus noticed he looked all beaten up inside. It was the eyes
again.

“I’m sorry
I invaded your personal thoughts,” Severus apologised, “It was wrong of me. And
I will forget what I saw.” He gave a nod of his head.

Ron nodded
too. Severus turned and walked away. A voice inside Ron’s head was screaming. But you can’t forget me! I dare you. His
mind was braver than his voice.

***

That night
Ron turned the vial of dreamless sleep potion over in his fingers, staring
intently at the glass. When he’d gotten back to the dormitory, he’d found it on
his pillow, without a note, but he knew from whom it had come. The problem was
that he now couldn’t decide whether to take the potion or not. Snape had said
he couldn’t act on the things he had seen in Ron’s mind with certain finality
which Ron was ashamed to admit made his heart unexpectedly ache. He was scared
by the ever-so-quick attachment he seemed to have made to Severus Snape. But it
was the attachment which was preventing him from uncorking the bottle and
tipping it down his throat. He bit his lip and turned it over again. So… he
could continue dreaming and enjoy it, but know that it could only ever be
dreams (he felt increasingly stupid for even assuming it could be anything
more), or he could take the potion for a few nights and hope his subconscious
forgot its new favourite figure of attention.

He turned
the bottle over again and stared at the carpet. What was the point of torturing
himself? In two days he had become too attached from just two dreams and a
daydream. Two days. How would he be after four, a week, a month? With this
thought he got to his feet and crossed to the water jug on the table in the
middle of the room. He poured himself a glass, uncorked the vial and poured the
liquid into the water. He swirled it round and took a deep breath. He raised
the glass up.

“Oh sod it
I’m parched,” Harry banged into the room, “Give me that.”

In one
fluid motion, Harry grabbed the glass from Ron’s raised hand and chugged back
the water. Ron simply stared at him.

“Sorry,”
Harry wiped his mouth, “That’s much better. Fierce Quidditch
game tonight, some Ravenclaws decided they wanted a
house challenge and we couldn’t back down. I came to find you but you were
gone?”

“Oh, I went down to the village,” Ron said quietly, walking back to his bed.

So, that
was it. His potion was gone and surely the night hours ahead were going to be
full of the kind of thoughts he was both looking forward to and dreading at the
same time.

“Oh yeah,
was it busy tonight?”

“Was
getting that way, but I didn’t stay that long, didn’t have much money on me.”

“Ah right.
Shame, I would have come with you.”

“Wanted
some time to myself,” Ron smiled, and pulled his top over his head, getting
ready for bed.

“Right,”
Harry nodded, “Guess you were thinking about the thing which you don’t want to
talk about?”

“Right,”
Ron replied, and threw his jeans over the trunk at the end of his bed.

He crawled
under his sheets and plumped up his pillows. “Night,” he called to Harry, and
drew the curtains around his bed. He loved the privacy they gave, even if they
were ugly.

All the
light was cut out now bar the little candle above his pillows, which he snuffed
with his wand. He shifted down and rested his head on the pillows lying flat on
his back. He drummed his thumbs on the covers over his stomach. He couldn’t
believe Harry had drunk his potion just like that, after he’d argued so
precisely with himself over what he should do… after all that, the decision had
been made for him oh-so-easily by a thirsty friend. Of course, he could get
dressed again, creep out, and go and ask Snape for another vial of it, but the
thought didn’t thrill him with joy. In fact, the only thrill it did give him was knowing that when he knocked on the door and it opened,
Severus Snape would be standing on the other side looking back at him. Probably grumpily, considering the late hour.

He drummed
his thumbs again and closed his eyes and exhaled. Just sleep, it was just
sleep.

“Night,
Ron,” Harry called quietly. “Happy dreaming.”

“Sod off.”

***

Severus
eased himself onto his sofa, deep in thought. When he’d returned to the castle,
he instantly arranged for the vial of potion to be delivered to Weasley’s dormitory to make it easier for him to make the
choice. It wasn’t easy to have an infatuation, at any age. He quickly took a
sip of his tea, eager to avoid sinking into those particular thoughts tonight.
He was feeling bad about the way he had walked off and left Weasley
alone in the trees, and was half wondering if he’d come back yet. At the time,
walking away and being strong seemed like the respectable thing to do. If the
young man was confused, he wasn’t sure what good, if any, his continued
presence around him would achieve. So he had walked away, but he was starting
to feel regretful of how cold this probably felt to Weasley.
He drank some more tea. It was gone midnight, and he couldn’t help but wonder
if now, in the recesses of Gryffindor
Tower, Ron Weasley was sprawled over his four poster bed, lost in a
dream which involved the two of them. He’d be a blatant liar if he said the
idea didn’t bolster his ego, because it did. Weasley
had blossomed into an attractive soul which Severus couldn’t deny. In his mind
he did a quick sweep of Ron’s features, blue eyes, creamy but freckled skin,
blazing shaggy hair and a wide smile with more warmth than a log fire. Tall, strong…yet lanky. The images he’d seen in Ron’s mind
came to the fore of his. The embrace, tender yet strong… the kiss, wet and
warm, the feeling of his hand exploring the other body. He shivered lightly and
banished the images away. It would do no good to dwell on them when he knew he
couldn’t act on them if he wanted to.

And, if he
could, his mind wandering into the realms of possibility, would he want to? He
hadn’t been with another person in years, by both choice and lack of interest.
His attraction to both sexes hadn’t even broadened his prospects. He knew this
was likely to be for one reason, though –that his heart hadn’t been any of the
relationships, because at that point he was still in love with another. He
drained his mug and stood, stretching his arms up over his head and yawning. He
turned and walked to the south-west corner of his office and unlocked the door
to his living quarters, lighting the room as he went.

The bed
stood uninvitingly in the corner. His mind threw up the image of the embrace
again and he stopped, looking at the bed. His mind went further and placed the
long limbed redhead spread eagled in the middle.

“Enough,” he said to himself harshly. “Enough.”

***

It was warm again, and the sun beat
down on his head. He wanted to find some shade but he found himself transfixed
by the beautiful view. He was looking out at a valley, the mountains lined with
pine trees and rocks, sheep grazing in the basin at the bottom. He was standing
at the edge of winding road, cars whizzed past every so often. The view was
simply beautiful. He knew he’d never been here before though, and there were no
signposts. More cars whizzed past. There was a house behind him made from grey
stone adorned by flowers and potted shrubs. He looked out over the valley again
and breathed in the fresh air.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” A quiet voice
beside him asked.

“Amazing,” Ron said in agreement,
and slipped his hand into Severus’.

“I bought you here to show you the
parts of my past that weren’t bad,” Severus said. “I hope you like it.”

Ron nodded and smiled enthusiastically.
“Where’s the river, you said there was a big river?”

“We’ll have to walk a bit to find
that,” Severus said. “Come on.”

They seemed to reach the river in no
time at all, Ron was confused how they’d managed to
get there so quickly. But he ignored it and in any case, his attention was
grabbed by the rushing of water over rocks, the sound of laughter and chatter,
and the sights of a quaint little village set in the mountains. He squinted at
a sign.

“Betws-y-Coed?” He mispronounced. “How on earth do you say that? Where are we?”

Severus laughed and told him how to
pronounce it. “Or, you can just say ‘Betsy co-ed’ like every other English
person that comes through here,” he smiled. “And we’re in Wales.”

“I’ve never been before, it’s
beautiful,” Ron commented, stopping to hang over a low stone wall on a bridge,
looking down to the river.

“If you come down here you’ll be
able to get closer, I think,” Severus murmured. “It’s been a long time since I
was here.”

They walked over the bridge, winding
their way through the tourists and dogs on leads. The pavement melted into the
river, and all around people were paddling or sat perched on rocks, dipping
their feet into the cool water.

And Ron could tell it was cool, he
felt the freshness on his clammy skin. He could sense how good it would feel to
kick off his shoes and socks, roll up his jeans and sit with his legs dangling
into the rushing water. A dog barked at the sound it made not far away, Ron
watched it for a time.

“Come on,” Severus said, giving his
hand a tug. “We can sit down.” He motioned to a big rock just vacated by a
young family.

Ron sat down near the edge and
reached down to pull off his footwear and roll up his trousers. His feet hit
the water with a splash and he found himself gasping as icy droplets bounced up
his legs and clung to the hair there.

“Brisk?” Severus winked, shifting
himself so he was sat cross legged on the rock.

“Just a bit,” Ron laughed, peering
down and finding himself surprised at the clarity of the water.

“It’s very clean,” Severus assured
him, not that he thought Ron would care.

“This really is a great place, thank
you for showing me it.”

“My pleasure. As I said… I thought I should share something
that wasn’t all doom and gloom about my past for once.”

Ron looked on him tenderly and
placed a hand on his knee. “So why is this place special to you?”

Severus looked around. He wasn’t
looking to see who could overhear, but trying to gather his thoughts to
properly explain why he’d dragged the redhead hundreds of miles to see the place.
He wasn’t quite sure he could.

A child shrieking from the cold
broke his concentration, and he looked up to see her father sweep her up out of
the water with a smile on his face, whilst she giggled and kicked her feet
about to dry them. How apt, a decent father figure turning up just when he was
about to explain about his distinct lack of one…

“Severus?” Ron asked, looking at
him.

But everything was fading away.

Ron looked
at the clock, four in the morning. He groaned with annoyance. He didn’t mind
his dreams being interrupted by the actual morning, when it was time to get up.
But it was nowhere near time, considering it was a Saturday, and he bet that
the  sky was only just beginning to turn
grey round the edges preparing for the sunrise. He rolled over onto his front
and wrapped his arms around his pillows, closing his eyes. Maybe he could get
the dream back again to hear whatever it was that Severus had been about to
tell him about the sweet little Welsh village in the mountains. He had liked the
dream… and it was nice to have had one which wasn’t sexual. He tried to empty
his mind so that he could fall back asleep without trouble, but he sensed that
it wasn’t going to happen. He couldn’t get up, he’d wake the entire dormitory
and on a Saturday morning his name would be mud for doing so this early. But
there was nothing he could do lying in his bed, either, and even though it had
only been minutes from his waking, he felt energetic and bored with lying down.

He thought
of how he would usually spend time like this, and despite himself a small grin
crept across his face. Yes, he could remember many an occasion wasting a happy
hour or two lying in bed enjoying himself, yet for some reason he didn’t feel
right doing it at that moment. It almost felt, he realised, like he was
cheating on dream Severus. And that was quite simply bizarre. Severus. Thinking
the name conjured up images before his closed eyes. The long hair and pale
face, obsidian eyes with a stare to rival Medusa. His brain tried to go back to
the other dreams, the dirtier dreams with only one conclusion. He wondered if
there was any point fighting the memories, seeing as they were coming to him so
consistently. Maybe he should just allow himself to fall head first back into
them, enjoy them… considering if he found some potion by that evening, he might
never have another filthy dream about Severus Snape again. That thought made a
little jolt in his stomach, he didn’t like that idea at all. He cradled his
pillow tighter and ground his hips forward into the mattress. His mind wandered
with the dreams.

By eight o’
clock in the morning, however, he’d really had enough of lying down. Quietly,
he rose and dressed, trying not to make a sound and disturb the others. As he
clicked the door of the dormitory shut, he mentally congratulated himself on
his success before starting down the stairs. He wondered when the last time he
was actually up at 8am on a Saturday was. It must have been a long time ago
because he found himself wondering whether breakfast would even be in the Great
Hall at this hour. Even Hermione normally slept in on Saturdays. He eased
himself out of the portrait hole and meandered along the corridor with his
hands in his pockets. The portraits yawned sleepily as he passed, many of the occupants
were snoring against the frames, and even they weren’t up yet. Ron cursed his
internal body clock and started down the stairs to the entrance hall. It was
deserted, but the doors to the Great Hall were open and he could hear a few
voices speaking quietly inside. He made his way to Gryffindor table, where
absolutely nobody was seated at all. Great,
some peace and quiet! He thought cheerily to himself, sitting down and
pulling towards him a plate and the tongs for the bacon. He was loading up his
plate when a thought came to him. A place name, in fact,
Welsh, hard to say. Betwys-y-Coed. He narrowed his
eyes in concentration, trying to think where the name had come from and what it
meant. The images rolled back to him of lush green fields, sheep, the valley,
the trees and rocks and the gushing cold river. He never had found out the
significance of it to Snape.

And was
there any real significance, or was this just something that dream Snape had
thought up? Was there any truth at all? Ron suspected there was, after all, all
of the other things about dream Snape had been spot on, even down to alcohol
preference. What did it mean? He was suddenly overcome with anxiety to know
exactly what the significance of the place was to Severus. His eyes flew to the
staff table but he wasn’t there, nobody was –it was empty.

His chest
deflated and he thought on it some more. How would he ask, anyway? “Sir, in my dream you took me to Wales and
showed me a lovely place with a river and you were about to tell me what it was
to you when I woke up, and then I had a lovely wank thinking about you.” With a smile, Ron conceded
that that plan really wouldn’t work.

“Up early, Weasley?” came a voice from behind him, “I trust that you,
uh, slept well?”

Ron
swivelled to see Severus standing behind him, tall in his usual black robes.

“Yes,
Professor,” Ron said quietly, his sudden meekness (considering the nature of
his thoughts that morning) surprising even him.

“I’m glad
the potion was of use to you,” Severus replied, and gave a curt nod and made to
walk away.

“I didn’t
use it,” Ron said, a little more loudly. “There was an intervention.”

Severus
turned and raised an eyebrow at him, “An intervention?”

“I intended
to drink it,” Ron shrugged, “But something happened and someone else did
instead.”

“I see.”

Ron nodded
and picked up his fork. Ask him. He
speared some bacon. Ask him. He put
the bacon in his mouth and chewed. Severus was still standing there looking at
him. ASK HIM! Ron tried to drown out
the screaming of his mind. He wasn’t going to ask here, he wasn’t sure of the
reaction it would invoke in Severus, if any. And he wanted an honest, feeling
answer to the question. He’d have to figure out another time to ask which was
right.

“Weasley…” Severus began, taking a tentative step closer.

Ron turned
his back round and swallowed his mouthful. “Professor?”

Whatever
bottle Severus thought he had, he lost it, so said, “Well. If you would like
more, you know where my office is. But if that is too, er,
difficult for you to go through with, you can go to the Hospital Wing and feign
nightmares. Heh, maybe you wouldn’t even have to lie
that much.”

“Sir?”
Ron frowned, missing the meaning.

“Nothing,”
Severus shook his head. “Nothing. Enjoy your
breakfast.” He motioned to the food.

“Dreaming
about you is anything but a nightmare,” Ron said softly, then turned back to
his place, ending the conversation.

He kept his
eyes on the food until Severus’ footsteps had faded from his hearing. Then he
looked around to see if anyone would have heard their exchange, but the hall
was just as empty as when he’d arrived. Severus took his seat at the teacher’s
table, unfolded a copy of the Prophet and buried his nose in it whilst
absent-mindedly stirring a cup of tea. Ron steadily made his way through his
breakfast, pausing only to pour himself more pumpkin juice. His mind was
swimming with ways to go and ask the question, and he found himself quite
agitated wanting to know the answer. He finished his food and set the knife and
fork down noisily on the plate in the position which signalled to those below
that he was done with it. Instantly, the plate disappeared. He selected an
apple from a nearby fruit bowl and took a bite. Juice flowed down his chin and
he swore under his breath. He wiped the back of his hand across it and his eyes
flitted upwards. Severus was staring at him, though he quickly looked away when
Ron returned the gaze.

What did
that mean? Ron finished eating the apple and stood, ready to leave. He
misjudged the space between him and the bench, and in trying to move created a
mighty thud. He swore loudly as pain shot up his thighs and the impact sites
just above his knees throbbed. The Hogwarts’ house table benches were legendary
for their weight and durability. That also meant they were heavy and that they
could incapacitate someone for a few days if due care wasn’t taken. Gingerly
Ron eased one leg over the bench and his knee protested. He bought the other
leg over to join it and tried to bend them both. He winced at the pain and
turned to limp into the entrance hall, finding that he was going slowly.
Somehow, even though he couldn’t see, he was sure that Severus’ eyes were on
his retreating back. It made him pull back his shoulders a little, walk a
little taller. He was flooded again with an intense need to ask about the
village and what it meant. He didn’t know what to do with himself now, either.

He’ll finish eating soon, and he’ll
go back to his office, where it’s private and you can ask without making an
idiot of yourself.
Ron doubted this was true, he could make an idiot out
of himself with barely any help at all from outside sources. He had a nervous
feeling in the pit of his stomach as his feet turned and took him to the path
for the dungeons, the Slytherin dorms and Severus’
office. He realised at that moment that he was no longer Snape, but Severus.
His subconscious was clearly on a level where it wanted to be more grown up
than to use a surname.

He passed
the Potions classroom and his feet followed the downward slope of the corridor,
feeling the temperature drop as he went. He heard that extra heaters had to be
used in the Slytherin dorms because in the winter the
students could turn blue if the weather tried hard enough. It made him grateful
for the warmth of Gryffindor tower. The corridor forked, and he took the left.
The right lead to the Slytherin common room and he
really didn’t want to meet anybody down there. Severus’ office door came into
view and he bit his lip nervously. He limped up to it and looked around. There
weren’t even any portraits, it was grim. The walls were a little slimy, bare
spare one tapestry at the end of the corridor and the temperature was low
enough that he could breathe out and see it rise in the air before him.

Ron leant
against the wall next to the door, unwilling to touch the wood because Severus
was known for casting ample protection spells on his office to keep out
intruders. If he was honest, Ron was even a little scared to breathe near it,
but that couldn’t possibly be construed as an offence, could it?

The sound
of footsteps made his breath catch in his throat. It was most likely Severus, nobody else would be coming to see him at this time
of morning, unless it was another teacher. Ron frowned, he’d not considered
that, how would he explain his loitering outside Severus’ door? He didn’t have
much time to contemplate his excuse, however, as Severus rounded the corner
with a swish of his black robes.

“Weasley?” He asked, looking up from the floor
where his gaze was fixed. “What are you doing here?”

“I have
something I need to ask you,” Ron said carefully, standing up straight and
taking his hands out of his pockets; his legs ached and he wanted to sit down.

“Well ask
it then,” Severus said, folding his long arms over his chest.

“I would
prefer it if I could do it in private,” Ron cast hopeful eyes to the office
door.

“Weasley, it would be improper for me to let you into my
office knowing your delicate emotional situation at the moment.”

Bugger. Now what? “Please?”

Severus
stood still for a moment, then sighed, pulled out his wand and started sweeping
it whilst whispering, removing all the spells and charms. He opened the door
and motioned Ron inside.

Ron entered
and looked at the grungy office with wide eyes. He’d only ever been in here
before when he was in trouble. But it was just as grungy when he wasn’t. A desk, hundreds of books, a fireplace, an old sofa, and doors
leading off it to more private rooms. His stomach gave a lurch at the
thought of Severus Snape’s private rooms and he things he would do in there. Concentrate, fool.

Severus
warily shut the door and cast a privacy spell on it. It wouldn’t do to have an
eavesdropper on this conversation, he was sure. He moved quickly to sit behind
his desk, putting a respectable amount of distance between himself and Ron.

“So, your question?”

“Right,”
Ron bit his lip.

Severus
waited for him to begin speaking, and when he didn’t he shifted in his chair
and rested his chin on steeped fingers. Ron couldn’t seem to find the words.

“I’m a busy
man, Weasley.” Liar. You were going
back to bed.

“What’s in Betws-y-Coed?” Ron asked, a
slight tremor to his voice.

“Excuse
me?” Severus asked, knowing that his mouth had fallen open. “What did you say?”

“What’s in Betws-y-Coed?” Ron repeated. “Does it hold any
significance to you personally?”

Severus was
actually borderline speechless. He couldn’t decide what to say. In the end he
settled on, “Why are you asking about this?”

Ron took a
deep breath and Severus sensed a story coming on.

“Last night
after I didn’t take the potion, I fell asleep. I was looking at a valley, lined
with trees and massive grey rocks, sheep at the bottom of the valley. A stone house behind me. It was sunny. I was looking at the
view. Then you came up to me and asked me if I liked it… you said you wanted to
show me some of your past that wasn’t bad.” Ron paused for effect, searching
Severus’ face to see if this was going to extract a reaction.

It did, but
not one that either of them could have pre-empted. Severus had paled with each
continued word as he saw before him what Ron described. He was angry, too.
Angry that Ron should have snooped and unearthed this information from
somewhere. But then he said he dreamt it. “Then what happened?” He asked
against better judgement.

“You took
me to a big flowing river, in the town beginning with B which is incredibly
hard to say so don’t make me say it again. Actually in the dream you told me to
call it Betsy Coed because that was what-”

Severus
stood up abruptly. “This is ridiculous. Where did you drag all this information
up from, Weasley?” His voice was escalating to a
shout.

“I dreamt
it, honestly….” Ron said, worried by the reaction. “You took me to the river,
we sat down, I dangled my feet in it… and you said you were going to explain to
me why the place was so important to you. Then I woke up for no reason at all.”

Severus was
utterly confused by it. Ron knew something that nobody other than himself knew
and he was at odds to find where he could have gleaned the information from. Unless he was telling the truth about the dream. “So you
want to know what the significance was?”

Ron nodded
and leant back in his chair. “If you don’t mind,” he said uncertainly. “I don’t
want to… upset you.”

“Of course
I mind,” Severus hissed. “Of course I mind that you’re apparently dreaming up
issues which haven’t been considered in years. But you want to know what it
means? Fine.”

He strode
to one of the bookcases and selected from one shelf a greying volume with black
lettering on the front. Ron could make out the word ‘photographs’. Severus
opened the book and went through the pages, being careful to shield them from
Ron’s view until he reached the page he was looking for.

“Fine.
There.” He set the book down on the desk in front of Ron. “I need a drink. Do
you want anything?”

Ron wanted
to wince at his harsh tone but knew better. “Tea, please.”
Tea would keep him there longer and although the conversation was awkward and
he didn’t like it when Severus was angry, he liked being in his company, he
found.

Severus
turned on his heel and Ron drank in the pictures in the photo album. The
valley, the river… there were shots of them all, accompanied by a small, slight
boy with dark hair and a hook shaped nose. With a rush of affection, Ron
realised he was looking at Severus aged around eight, from the look of him. He
turned the page and found more pictures from the same place, accompanied by a
woman and an older woman, who both had the same features, clearly mother and
daughter. The daughter, Ron assumed, was Severus’ mother, as he was holding her
hand. Ron noted that the pictures were clearly muggle,
none of the inhabitants moved and the river didn’t flow. Entranced, he flipped
to the front of the album. It was full of old pictures and family memories, an
unsmiling man in his forties with deep black hair and a hooked nose. Severus’
father, Ron presumed. He saw an old house, near a mill, a dark looking thing
where natural light had long since vacated. Pictures of Severus in the garden,
never looking very happy and his mother with him, looking equally unhappy, and
the man, looking the most unhappy of them all. Ron was
just turning back to look at the front again when a noise made him look up.
Severus was standing wordlessly at the side of the desk, gripping two mugs of
tea so tightly that his knuckles were as white as his face, which was contorted
with anger. He banged the mugs down on the desk and ignored the tea which
slopped everywhere, trickling off the sides of his desk and running towards Ron
and the photo album. He snatched it up off the wood and snapped it shut
violently.

“Did I say
you could look through it?” he snarled through ground teeth.

“No,” Ron
said, instantly feeling guilty. “No you didn’t, I’m sorry.”

“YOU SHOULD
BE.” Severus shouted, sweeping his wand to remove the spilled tea.

He slammed
the album down again on his side of the desk. “YOU HAD NO RIGHT.”

“I’ve said
I’m sorry,” Ron mumbled, his cheeks colouring, he shrank back into the chair.

Carried
away with his anger, Severus moved closer, felt his hand twitching with rage.
He wanted to smack the redhead across his blushing cheeks, make him hurt and
truly regret prying into his painful past. Ron looked at him with wide and
slightly terrified blue eyes. Severus took a deep breath and lowered his hand.
He moved silently and quickly back round to his side of the desk and sat,
placing one hand across the album. “Did you see it all?” He asked, much more
quietly and calmly.

Ron was almost afraid to answer but felt he had to be honest. “I did, I saw it
all.”

Severus
exhaled and closed his eyes, gathering his thoughts. Ron looked at him and
thought that his dreams would never do justice for the real thing.

“The
significance of the Welsh village is this. My father, as you might have been
able to tell from his pictures, was not a happy man. My mother married him
under duress and convinced herself she loved him. They produced me for their
unhappy little world to be complete. My father was a muggle.
My mother was a witch. We were restricted in many ways, which I won’t bother to
depress you with. You’re young and you’re from a loving family. You need not
know the suffering of others.” He paused and tapped his fingers on the album.

To Ron’s
surprise, he opened it, and pointed to a picture. “This is me, aged seven, in
his presence. My demeanour is clear –unhappy, miserable one might say, slumped
and listless.” He flipped forward a few pages to the pictures which Ron
recognised from his dream. “Look at me here. Aged eight.
My father did not ‘do’ holidays. We stayed with my maternal grandmother,
you’ll see the similarities between my mother and grandmother.” He indicated
with his finger. “But look at me. Really look at me. What do you see?”

Ron looked
at the boy in the picture. He was smiling, he was clean, he
stood tall holding his mother’s hand. “You look happy,” Ron looked up at
Severus. “A different kid, really. Your father wasn’t
with you.”

“No,”
Severus said softly, letting the book sit openly. “We went there three years in
a row, just me and my mother. It was like an escape, a different world. By the
river hoping to catch pixies my father seemed like a monster in a book. When we
returned home everything would return to normal, maybe the beatings would
increase because we’d had the audacity to leave for a while,” Severus shook his
head.

Ron’s
stomach tightened. He’d wondered if that had been what Severus meant by
suffering. He hated the thought of that young boy being scared to go home,
scared for his mother… and as Severus had suggested, it was a very different
family life to what he himself had grown up in.

“Sorry,”
Severus said quietly. “I know it’s uncomfortable to hear.”

“Nowhere
near as uncomfortable as it must have been to live it,” Ron shook his head,
fighting the urge to grab the man’s hand as it lay on the table.

“Well. There
you have your significance,” Severus sighed, picking up his mug and drinking
some tea, indicating with his free hand that Ron should do the same.

“But how
did I dream that?” Ron asked, licking his lips.

“I truly
don’t know,” Severus sounded confused. “You promise me you didn’t look anything
up anywhere?”

“On my
life,” Ron said simply.

Severus
drank some more tea. Was it a premonition? Would he take Ron there… and they’d
be together? “Have you ever had a premonition before, Weasley?”

“Ron,” he
said, having had enough of hearing his own last name.

“Ron,”
Severus repeated, testing the feel of it on his tongue –he wasn’t used to first
names with students other than a select few. “Have you ever had a premonition
before?”

“No,” he
replied, without even having to consider it. “Boring as grass, me. Nothing interesting or spectacular about my mind.”

Complimenting
him would be out of character, and Severus was getting extremely conscious of
the closeness between them at the desk and his senses were heightened. “Hmm.”

Thanks for disagreeing with me,
bastard. Ron was a
little shocked to find he was actually hurt by it. Severus noticed.

“Look, Ron,
I’m trying my hardest here not to get too involved. I do that and everything
falls to pieces, including me.”

“But this
dream means something, I know it does,” Ron said quietly. “How
have I got these links to you, and why, if they don’t mean something?”

“You’ve got
them because you had them once and you wanted them again,” Severus shrugged.

“Oh, you
think I wanted to have this? That I’m not really confused right now? Am I gay,
am I not, is it just you or is it others, do I still like girls? Do you really
think this is fun?”

Severus was
cast back to the time of exploring his own sexuality… until a certain point, fun wasn’t a describing word he’d have used. “No, fair point.”

“Why would
you fall to pieces?” Ron asked suddenly.

Severus
didn’t answer. He drank more tea.

“Why?” Ron
repeated.

“When
you’ve been alone for a time, as I have…” Severus said, but stopped. It sounded
wrong that way. “Look, Ron, you’re just going through a tough time. It happens
to most young men.”

“It’s more
than that,” Ron shook his head. “I might not be intelligent,
or fancy on the Quidditch field, but I know that this
is more than your run of the mill crush.”

“Stop
saying that,” Severus burst out irritably.

“What?” Ron
asked, taken aback.

“Stop
implying you aren’t special,” Severus said. “Each time we speak you seem to
drive yourself further into the ground.”

Ron blushed
and stared at the carpet. “Sorry.”

“Stop
apologising.”

“Sorry.”

“Not
funny,” Severus sighed, setting down his mug.

They sat in
silence a moment. Ron really didn’t want to leave but he was getting towards
the end of his tea and he would soon have no excuse to stay.

“You need
to get over this,” Severus said matter-of-factly. “Because it reality it’ll
just make your life harder. You’re coming up to your exams,
you need a clear head to do well.”

“I don’t
care about the exams,” Ron said quietly. “I care about you.”

“Stop, this
is ridiculous.” Severus got to his feet. “I could deal with you when you were
acting normally but you’ve morphed into a lovesick teenager as the
conversation’s gone on, and that I do not have time for. Sort yourself out, Weasley, and don’t come knocking on my door again. And if I
find you’ve told anyone about what you’ve learnt about my past here today, you
will pay, do you understand me?”

Ron got to
his feet and sighed. “I understand, and I’m offended you think so little of my
character to assume I would.” He moved to the door. “I’m sorry.”

Severus
tried to think of something to say that wasn’t too harsh. His temper had got
the better of him again and he regretted it. “I don’t mean to be harsh-”

“Yes, you
do,” Ron said glumly, his hand on the doorknob. “You always do.”

“I just
don’t think you mean this. A dream is different to reality. A dream builds
false expectations and shattering those is painful.”

“You think
you’ll shatter my expectations?” Ron asked, turning back to face him.

“On top of
all the other very logical reasons why nothing should come of this, Ron, yes, I
do believe that. I have a habitual practice of disappointing everybody.” He
took a breath. “I wouldn’t be good for you.”

“Now who’s
running himself into the ground?” Ron took a few steps toward Severus, as many
as he dared.

“Shut up,”
Severus moaned, rubbing his hands over his face.

Ron took
his chance whilst the other man’s vision was impaired and crossed the rest of
the distance between them, he had a distinct ‘now or
never’ feel in his stomach.

Severus didn’t
take his hands away from his face; he could sense Ron’s proximity to his body
and didn’t know how to handle it. He was in too deep now to not permanently
hurt Ron’s feelings. And he surprised himself in finding the thought of doing
that repellent.

“Please,”
he whispered, he knew Ron could hear. “I’ve taught here for so long that it’s
my life now. I can’t lose it because of a relationship with a student.”

“I won’t be
a student for much longer,” Ron said, equally as softly. “Just two and a half
more months and I’m free.”

“Still….
There are other issues, like your age, and you still don’t know whether this is
the right sexual path for you. Forgive me, but at my age I don’t think I could
take the major upheaval should you decide that I’m not right for you any more.”

“The dream
makes me believe that won’t happen.”

“It’s just
a dream.”

“It bought
me to you.”

“Please,
Ron…”

“What are
you asking me?” Ron walked closer.

“Leave now,
please.”

“And if I
don’t?” He bumped lightly into Severus’ side and stopped.

With a
shaky breath, Severus pulled his hands away from his face. “If you don’t then
I’ll have to do this.”

With a
quick motion, Severus framed Ron’s face between his hands, and connected their
lips together in a kiss. “I can’t believe this,” he breathed, hanging his head.
“It took less than 24 hours for you to break me.”

“Maybe I’m
super talented,” Ron smiled, bringing his hand up to brush away the hair over
Severus’ eye.

“Or maybe I
am just supremely weak,” Severus sighed. “It’s more likely.”

Ron
considered his next question carefully. “When was the last time you had a
relationship?”

Lie. Lie. “About ten years ago.” You should have lied.

Ron’s face
was unreadable. When he spoke, he took hold of Severus’ other hand. “No matter
to me. You’ve beaten me at least.”

“Because
ten years ago you were eight years old,” Severus groaned and tried to tug free.

Ron,
however, caught him and wrapped his arms around his torso, preventing any
movement. “Stop. If we want it to, we can work this
out. Please. Stop with the age digs.”

“Digs?”

“If I could
be older for you, to make you feel better, I would.”

“Don’t wish
your life away.”

Ron
silenced him with a kiss.

Against his
better judgement, Severus kissed him back and brought his arms up to place his
hands on Ron’s back. They stood for a moment enjoying the kiss but again
Severus pulled away, a guilty look taking hold of his features.

Ron, on the
other hand, felt so light and dizzy he might fall over. Surely men were meant
to remain a bit more rooted, sensible about these things? Clearly
not. He blinked a few times and released Severus, and stumbled over to
the old sofa. His legs were aching from the blow at breakfast, and he hissed
slightly as he sat down.

“Your legs
hurt from this morning?” Severus asked, following him over but not sitting
down.

“Just a
bit,” Ron rubbed his thighs. “It’ll go away.”

With a pang
of annoyance, Severus realised that he was worried. About a
knock to the kneecaps. He chewed the inside of his bottom lip as he
thought about what he should do next. The kiss had complicated things further
than he thought he’d let them get.

“Ron,” he
breathed, and sat down on the small wooden coffee table facing the sofa.

“Severus,”
Ron replied, sensing the tone.

With a
little laugh, Severus put a hand on each of his knees, bracing himself. “What
just happened was wrong.”

“Or it was
right.”

“Wrong.”

“Maybe
there is no right or wrong?”

“There is
most definitely right or wrong here.”

“Well we’re
disagreeing, therefore technically, there’s no right or wrong answer because we
can’t agree. But just for the record, I think I’m right, that it’s right.”

Severus
blinked, searching through the logic. “Well, I’m thinking I’m right that it was
wrong,” he retorted stubbornly.

Ron just
laughed, shifted in his seat and leant back. “You didn’t like it?”

“That’s not
what I meant.”

Another
laugh and he shook his head.

“Why on
earth are you laughing?”

“If it was
so wrong, you wouldn’t have done it a second time.” Ron reasoned. “Everybody
makes mistakes. If the first kiss, which by the way you instigated, was a
mistake, then you shouldn’t have agreed to a second. Because you could have
declined and I would only have been mildly hurt… but accepting the second was
sort of an agreement that this was ‘happening’. And you can’t take that away
now.”

Oh he’s got a fast mouth. “If you applied this much logic and
thought to Potions you’d be beating Granger in every test.”

“Ah, but I
don’t find Potions as interesting as you.”

“Shame.
You’d find it more fulfilling.”

“There we
go with the self-depreciation again. I think we’re pretty perfect for one
another, you know.”

“How so?”
Severus was un-nerved by how easy it was to sit and simply chat with Ron.

“I know
nothing but self-depreciation. I’m the youngest of six brothers and the child
that came after me was the girl they’d gone through six boys to get. I’m like a
useless entity. I’m not the smartest, I’m not the most athletic, I’m not a
charmer, I’m not the best looking. I’m just there. And you, well… you never
seem to have anything nice to say about yourself either. And I think that makes
us perfect for one another.”

“Why?”

“Well. I
can tell you about the nice things about you, and you can make me feel wanted.
How’s that for working out well?”

Severus
chuckled and shook his head. “So you’re saying because we’re so depressed and
lost in our own grudges and issues that we make a good team?”

Ron nodded.

“That’d
make for a cheery relationship.”

“Oh you
know what I mean, we’d help each through all that and
make it better.”

“You’re so
naive,” Severus said without thinking. “You think that it would really all go
away, just like that? I do have issues, issues you couldn’t dream of solving.”

“Well
nobody can solve your issues for you,” Ron said frankly, “Only you can do that.
No shame in having a little help though.”

Severus
thought on that for a while. All of a sudden it hit him how far they’d come
since Ron was waiting at his door that morning. He seemingly found himself on
the brink of a relationship he knew
was no good for either of them. It was all moving too fast and was clearly
ridiculous. How did this even happen? Question…
photo album… dream… Fine, so he knew how it’d happened. But still. It was
moving too fast and now he didn’t know how to extricate himself from the mess.

“I know
what you’re thinking,” Ron said. “That this is all going too fast, it’s weird,
how did you end up here, talking to me, kissing me, blah blah
blah.”

“You read
my mind,” Severus admitted, glancing upwards at him.

“It’s fine.
It is fast.” Ron shrugged. “I’ll go now, and leave you alone.” He got to his
feet and limped towards the door.

“Wait,”
Severus rushed forward, and grabbed his upper arm. “Just wait a moment.”

He looked
over Ron’s face and took in his cool gaze. How could he be so calm? After all,
wasn’t he the one having erotic dreams and god knows what in the night hour?

In thinking
that, Severus realised he hadn’t anything planned to say, he’d just wanted to
stop Ron from leaving, and that confused him further, because…

“Oh, I’m
confused,” he muttered, exhaled and hung his head.

“Me too,”
Ron murmured quietly.

They stood
in silence for a moment, each wondering what to say to make the other feel more
at ease with the world. Severus’ fingers were still curled around the form of
Ron’s upper arm, he couldn’t release it. Ron shifted his weight between his
feet.

“I don’t
know if I want you to leave or not,” Severus admitted. “I like,” he cleared his
throat, “I like having you here.”

“I like
being here, even if it is a bit disgusting. How do you live in this office?”

“It’s not
that bad!” Severus said, affronted. He looked around.

“You have
pickled things in jars which I’m scared to look closely at. And the walls are
slimy. And it’s cold even though I know the sun’s blazing upstairs.”

“It’s the
only place people will leave me alone,” Severus said wryly.

“Didn’t
work, I found you,” Ron pointed out.

“Heh, true.”

“So will
you brighten it up now?”

“Why on
earth would I?”

“Well… if
my visits down here were to become regular, I’d prefer it if it was a little
less dingy.”

“I’m
actually offended,” Severus said, looking around. “It’s
home.”

Ron gave
him such a look that he started to laugh. “What?” Ron blushed.

“Okay,
okay. If this becomes regular… I’ll sort it out. But nothing too much.”

“Can’t
teach an old dog new tricks, I suppose,” Ron winked.

“Watch who
you’re calling old,” Severus grumbled.

“I called
you old. Does that bother you?” Ron taunted, a flirtatious smile playing about
his lips.

It made his
breath catch in his throat. Ron looked so attractive he found himself thinking
about other things. In a fluid movement, he leapt forward and wrapped Ron in
his arms.

“What the-”
Ron gasped, but couldn’t finish his sentence because his words were muffled by
Severus’ lips.

The seconds
passed in a blur as Severus found himself forcing them
both to the floor, trapping Ron beneath him, never breaking the kiss. They were
both breathing heavily.

“Stop,
can’t breathe…” Ron muttered, and reluctantly Severus pulled up slightly.

Ron was
gasping on the floor, Severus noticed how when his
eyes were shut his eyelashes were long. “What was that?” he murmured when he
had some breath back in his lungs.

“Your
animal magnetism,” Severus grinned impishly. “I’m sorry if that was too
forward.”

“No apology
needed,” Ron shook his head slightly. “I enjoyed it.”

“So did I,” Severus murmured, lowering his head back down to kiss
him again.

It had been
years since he had done this with anyone else. It was coming back to him so
naturally, though, it was unnerving. It started to make him think Ron might be
correct about it just being ‘right’. But that thought equally scared him.

Beneath
him, Ron shifted on the floor and wrapped his arms around Severus’ back. “You
know, this is the point my dreams always seemed to get to before I got woken
up.”

“Before it
got any further…”

“Yes,
before it got any further.”

“It’s too
soon for it to go any further.”

“I thought
you’d say that.”

“Well at
least you’re not disappointed,” Severus gave him a wink.

Ron said
nothing, but Severus felt his body deflate a little and instantly felt bad.

“In good
time,” he whispered, close to Ron’s ear. “Just give me some time.”

“I know,”
Ron whispered back, and inclined his head towards Severus’.

There was a
knock on the door. Panic sent bolts of electricity straight to Severus’ heart,
and he leapt upright, pulling Ron with him by the wrists. Merlin knew what time
it was, how long they’d been there talking. Either way, nobody could see them
like this, all flushed.

“Just a
moment,” he called out towards the door, motioning with his finger across his
lips to silence Ron.

He then
tugged him towards the bedroom, and quickly unlocked the door.

“In here, and for Merlin’s sake be quiet,” he whispered
urgently, pushing Ron inside by spreading his fingers over his chest.

Ron didn’t
have time to protest as Severus closed the door and locked it again.

Swallowing,
he walked back to the office door and exhaled, shaking his head slightly. He
pulled open the door. “Headmaster!” he said loudly, so Ron would realise to be
extra quiet.

“Severus,”
Albus swept into the room with no further introduction.

When he
closed the door, he turned round and with a lurch of his stomach noticed the
two empty mugs of tea and open photo album. It was very clearly a depiction of
a conversation which had taken place. Albus appeared not to have notice as he
took to his weekly inspection of the pickled objects on the shelves. Pointing
his wand, Severus accurately vanished the mug to the
bedroom, thoughtfully re-filling it for Ron. He walked to the desk, and flipped
the lid of the album shut quietly.

“And how
are you today, Severus?” Albus asked, turning his attention back to his deputy
head with a smile.

“Fine, and yourself?” Better than fine… I’ve
got a hot young thing in my bedroom.

“Oh, pleasant enough!” Albus took Ron’s vacated seat. “The weather is beautiful
and I had a particularly exquisite coffee blend this morning sent by the
headmaster of the American Institute.”

Severus
smiled politely and sat down. He hated these visits, but over the years Albus
had been so good to him he felt obliged to keep them up.

“It’s a
shame you don’t get any of the light down here,” Albus said pointedly, as he
seemed to manage to do every weekend. “Sunlight is good for the soul.”

“I’m
managing fine without,” was Severus’ standard reply, with some feeling of boredness, having already had the conversation once that
morning.

“You should
get out more,” Albus smiled. “Anyway, I’m not staying for long,
I have business to attend to out of the school today, so I’ll have to cancel
our usual chat.”

Thank Merlin for small mercies. “Oh, that’s a shame. Personal business?”

“It’s a
weekend, of course personal,” Albus winked. He got to his feet. “Do try to get
out in the sunlight, Severus. It’ll do you some good.”

Severus
said nothing but stood up, there was no point in
replying. “Have a good day.”

Albus waved
and closed the door behind him. Severus flew to it and listened to the sound of
his footsteps fading away. When he could no longer hear them, he locked the
door and darted to his bedroom door, and unlocked that. He peered in, expecting
to find Ron plastered to the door trying to hear everything. He wasn’t. Severus
finally saw him perched on his bed cross legged, mug of tea in one hand and a
book in the other. He only looked up when Severus closed the door with a snap
behind him.

“Oh, that
was quick! I expected to be in here for bloody hours.”

“So did I,” Severus sauntered over to the bed. It was a weird
feeling, having someone else in his personal space, let alone a student. He
felt like he was breaking all the rules…. He actually was. It was written in
his contract that he wouldn’t do this. It could lose him his job if anyone
found out. He cast a look around the walls and thanked his good sense that he’d
removed all the portraits when he moved in, from his office and the hallway
too. He sat down next to Ron.

“You don’t
mind, do you?” Ron asked suddenly, looking up from the book. “Me
sitting here? I’ll sit on the floor if you do.”

“Why would
I mind?”

“Well,
people are funny about people sitting on their beds.”

“They are?”

“Some
people are.”

“Are you?”

“I live in
a shared dormitory. There’s no privacy. What do you think?”

“Well, I
lived in one too, so what do you think?”

“Fair
point,” Ron levelled, and took a mouthful of tea. “And thanks for this.”

Severus
shook his head. He was beginning to feel nervous. He glanced at his alarm
clock, they’d been talking –and kissing,
don’t forget the kissing- for nearly three hours. It was just gone eleven.

“Ron, won’t
your friends wonder where you are? Surely you left before they were up?”

Ron looked
at the clock and said, “Maybe. They can wonder all they like though.”

“Does… does
anyone know about your dreams? Would they come looking for you here?”

Ron looked
uncomfortable as he closed the book and put it aside. “Harry and Hermione know.
They figured it out for themselves.”

Of course
they’d know. The Golden Trio shared everything. Severus found the knowledge of
this repellent. Granger he could put up with, but Potter was another matter
entirely. It soured his mood for reasons he didn’t feel he could explain to
Ron, who was looking at him expectantly.

“Look,” Ron
said, and took a deep breath. “I know, that for whatever
reason,” he chose his words delicately, “You’re not Harry’s
biggest fan. For whatever reason, that’s okay. I understand that the world can’t
all get along. You haven’t been the nicest to any of us in the past, especially
me and Hermione, because we’re associated. It’s why I was so concerned when I
started to dream about you, and damn well confused when you kissed me. But it’s
not like I expect you to get together with my friends, or spend any time with
them at all. It’s not like that, okay? So can we please, please not let your dislike of Harry and my friends get in the way
of this? Not until we’re sure there’s anything to get in the way of?”

Severus
stared at him. “You know, Ron… many people would feel that if their partner
couldn’t like their friends, who had been with them years and years, then their
partner could take a running jump off a cliff.”

Ron stared
back, his jaw jutting a little. “What are you saying?”

“I’m just…
suggesting that you should disregard them so easily.”

“Who’s
disregarding anyone? Friendships and relationships don’t have to mix.”

“They might
not see it that way.”

“There’s
history here, though. This isn’t any normal situation. I might not know the
specifics but I know there’s history.”

“How do you
know?”

Ron rolled
his eyes, “Oh come on. You dislike Harry so much, there had to be a reason, and
I know you were at school with his dad, and Sirius Black and Remus Lupin. You didn’t like any
of them and when Lupin taught here in third year you
treated him like scum on the bottom of your shoe. I might have had a broken leg
during that little performance in the Shrieking Shack, but you were positively
vicious. You don’t get that way if there’s not history.”

Severus had
forgotten about that. He reached a hand over and stroked Ron’s leg where he
remembered the break was. “I’d forgotten you’d seen that.”

Ron
shrugged. “It’s not relevant, don’t dwell on it.”

Severus
exhaled. “Fine. I’ll try and keep it down to a
minimum. It’s easier now I’m not teaching him.”

Ron nodded.
“Easier for everyone that, trust me.”

Silence
fell between them again. Ron looked sideways at the clock.

“You should
go,” Severus said quietly in a sullen tone.

“Probably.”
He straightened his legs and swung them off the bed, knocking Severus’ hand
aside.

Again they
sat, the silence filtering between them. Sensing the awkwardness creeping in
like a mist, Ron leant and knocked his shoulder against Severus’ with a purposeful
glance. He leant his head on his shoulder.

He heard
the other man inhale, taking in the scent from his hair, Severus crept an arm
around his shoulders.

“It’s only
going to get weirder,” he said despondently, turning to the auburn mess and
resting his face in it.

Ron made a
sound in recognition. Severus kissed the top of his head. Another
action which he didn’t think about, but that he instinctively did.

“I can
handle weird,” Ron said decisively. “Can you?”

“I don’t… I
don’t know,” Severus answered truthfully. “I can’t give you an answer just
yet.”

Ron stood
up and turned to face him. “That’s okay,” he nodded. “I’m going to, er, go. I need to get some sunlight. The darkness is
getting to me.”

“Oh. Well.
At the end of this corridor, behind the tapestry, there’s a hidden passage.
Follow it through to the end and you’ll find yourself emerging behind the
greenhouses. You can get to the lake easily.”

“I never
knew that!”

“Not many
people do. Now, listen, whatever you do, don’t stop
for anyone in that tunnel, do you understand? Remember it’s a passage in the
dungeons of a castle and the ghosts in there… well the ghosts in there aren’t
as friendly as your regular ghosts, if you catch my meaning. Don’t talk to
them, don’t do anything –don’t even look, just walk.”

Ron shifted
his weight awkwardly with a worried look on his face, it took Severus a few
seconds to realise what was wrong. “You’re scared?” He asked incredulously.

“No,” Ron
said defiantly, colour rising to his cheeks. “But come on, you can’t say that
and expect someone not to get a little worried!”

“I wouldn’t
expect you to get worried, with everything you’ve been through.” Severus was
thinking of the brains that wrapped themselves around Ron in the Ministry when
he was just fifteen.

“I’m only
human, I suppose,” Ron shrugged, he turned and walked
out of the bedroom, making for the office door.

Severus let
him go, but followed at a distance. He wanted to see if Ron would pause on the
threshold, stop, run back and give him a kiss or a hug. He waited expectantly
as Ron’s hand touched the doorknob.

“This
morning was great, if confusing,” Ron’s voice floated back to him. “Thank you.”

“No
problem,” Severus said.

And that
was it, he was gone. Severus actually felt cheated. He’d thought there’d be
another kiss, a goodbye, a lingering glance or touch. But
nothing. He hated that he felt cheated by it. Maybe Ron thought he was
doing the right thing, by leaving without much affection, maybe he thought he
was making it easier for Severus to think. But cheated he felt, regardless.
And, he realised as he looked at the closed door, he felt a little empty, too.
The room seemed huge and unoccupied as he realised quite how quickly he’d
acclimatised to Ron’s presence in his living quarters. Did that mean, as Ron
believed, that the whole thing was ‘right’?

He looked
around for something to occupy himself with. All his marking was up to date.
His exam papers were written. He was waiting on an order of books from Flourish
and Blotts so he had nothing to read. He’d read the
paper at breakfast. It was nearly lunchtime. For some reason, at that moment,
Albus’ words chose that moment to come back to him –‘sunlight is good for the
soul’. A walk outside in fresh air might help him. He shrugged out of his robe,
there was no point wearing them outside if it was sunny, he would just melt. He
didn’t have to wear them, he just chose to. Underneath his clothes were plain,
also black. He pocketed his wand and went into the corridor, sealing the door
with his usual spells. His feet instinctively turned right to go through the
passageway, but he halted. He needed to get a clear head and that wouldn’t be
helped by seeing Ron again so quickly. But on consideration, if Ron had
followed his instructions –and he had looked worried enough to- he would have
cleared the tunnel by now and would have gone on his way. So it should be okay.
Comforting himself with that, Severus made for the tapestry, which was in place
as usual. So he made it through the
tapestry alive then… Severus thought, ducking behind it to be greeted with
the usual pitch black. “Lumos.”
The passage illuminated in front of him. No
dead bodies on the floor, that’s a good sign… He made his way along,
careful not to look left or right into the small alcove rooms which were far
too small to support human life. He knew they once had in putrid conditions. It
was this knowledge that kept him looking straight ahead. He saw the pearly
figures move from the corners of his eyes, but he would not look. He’d learnt
that lesson the hard way. A scar on his hairline twitched at the memory. A loud
thump came from his left and his heart accelerated, even though it was normal
behaviour for the inhabitants to get grumpy when an intruder walked by.

Painful
moaning came from along the tunnel further up, another regular. It didn’t do to
wonder what had been done to that particular soul, the
moaning was so distressing to experience. Severus tried to shut it out and sped
up; soon it was behind him. He knew he was reaching the end of the tunnel
because he passed through an ancient stone and iron grille long since left open,
and could smell the air getting cleaner with each footstep. He would return to
his rooms the normal way, he couldn’t face the tunnel
and its residents again that day. Blinded by the ring of light coming to greet
him, he blinked a few times before stepping out of the small, discreet entrance
into the daylight.

Ron had
been right, the sun was blazing. He blinked again and turned in the direction
of the lake, the sound of the water would be comforting and he could sit in the
shade and watch it for a while. Gather his thoughts. The grounds were full of
groups of students, it being a Saturday and a beautiful day, and he did his
best to keep to the shadows and dodge them.  Their chatter and laughter reached him. Some
had books out, revising, others were lying in the sun, others playing games. He
envied them, they were doing all the activities he
wished he’d had friends to carry out when he was at school. But that was a long
time ago, there was no point in dwelling on it.

He reached
the furthest point away from the school, at the opposite end of the lake
looking back at it. There were no students up here and there was shade in the
trees at the edge of the forest. He sat himself down with his legs bent in front
of him, letting his hands dangle over his knees. His eyes followed the squid
swimming lazily in the centre of the lake, flopping it’s tentacles to make a
splash every now and then.

Right, clear head. Fresh air. Sunlight.
Good for me. I’m getting burnt sitting here, Severus thought to himself.
I wonder where Ron went. He stopped
himself there. He wasn’t meant to be thinking about him in that sense, only in
the ‘what the hell do I do now?’ sense. Sighing, he kicked his legs out flat
and laid back on the grass, looking up at the light dappling in the leaves on
the high trees. It’d be nice to share
this with him. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He thought about
the morning, and what had happened, how the kisses had happened, who had
instigated them. He lead by two to one. And the second
was more than a kiss, it was pretty much pouncing on
the other man and tackling him to the ground and straddling him. Fast mover. I never used to be that fast… getting horny
in my old age. Right, there was the first problem. Age.
Ron was two months into his eighteenth year and Severus was coming up to his 39^th
birthday. A 21 year age gap. Cradlesnatcher. That’s what they’d call you. It was a
long time, longer than he was comfortable with. He’s so young, he’s seen nothing of the world
and of life… of pain. But Severus knew he couldn’t decide on that alone. At
18 he had seen more than most of pain and suffering due to his unfortunately
circumstances… but he knew for every one of him, there were
two of Ron. But the age gap, that was different. 21 years of life lived. At 18,
could Ron know what he really wanted? Severus thought back to when he was 18,
and if he’d known what he wanted. He knew he wanted to get away from his
father, so he did. That worked. He thought he knew the future path he wanted
for himself… and that did not work. His hand clutched his forearm out of habit.
No, that career move had certainly not worked out, left him playing the role of
a double agent and losing the thing that was the most precious of all to him. So. You could know your mind at eighteen, or not. That
bought him no closer to an answer. What else was a barrier? You’re his teacher. A problem that would
be solved when Ron left Hogwarts in two months time, although solving it only
so far… when the time for school to begin again, how would they find any time
to be with one another? And if got, say, five years down the line…. Nearing
forty-four, could Severus handle the rejection if Ron decided he’d had enough
and wanted to live his twenties properly? Even though he’d cocked up
spectacularly in his twenties and ruined his life, Severus could remember the
good parts.

He sighed
again. He was getting no closer. He hated soul-searching. He hated his soul. Ron seemed to like me though… he seemed to see
the good. But he hadn’t been around to see the bad, didn’t know the full
story. Severus wondered if this was half the problem. He was reluctant to get
into a relationship because it would involve telling the details of his past,
which he was highly ashamed of, and risk the heartbreak of the person leaving
him when they found out about his history. He bit his lip, it seemed a
plausible explanation. So then, if he confessed his sins to Ron, would he feel
better about continuing with what they were developing? He wasn’t thrilled at
the prospect of finding out.

He left his
thoughts for a moment and listened to the lake lapping at the shoreline. A bird
tweeted somewhere overhead. The sun had shifted and his feet were now cooking
in the light. It was so peaceful and beautiful. A little pang in his stomach
made him think of how nice it would be to share it with somebody. A breeze
gathered around him and ruffled the hair falling on his forehead. He couldn’t
help but wonder where Ron was, what he was doing and who he was doing it with.
And he found himself uncharacteristically bothered by the notion that he was
probably with his friends, laughing, being normal… he realised he’d like that
familiarity with Ron.

***

“Where were
you?” Hermione asked, pulling her Potions book out of her bag.

“I told you
at lunch, I was thinking about some things,” Ron said, setting his own bag on
the grass.

“Things
that had you up earlier than the rest of the Tower this morning?” she
commented.

“Well, I
couldn’t sleep, is all,” Ron shook his head, “I hate lying around in bed when
I’m awake.”

“Is
everything alright? Do you want to talk about anything?”

“No, c’mon, lets do some revision.”

“You seem
awfully keen to do this revision, it’s so unlike you,” she laughed, opening her
book at a marked chapter. “Oh, I really think this is going to be my weakest
subject, you know.”

“Utter
crap, Hermione.” Ron shook his head, “You are good at everything.”

“No I’m
not,” she said quietly, pulling out a quill and some parchment.

“Yeah,
right, little miss Outstanding everything last year,” Ron scoffed. He unscrewed
his ink bottle. His legs were starting to ache where he was sat cross legged.

“Oh shut
up,” Hermione breathed, “That was a fluke.”

“What are
we revising then?” Ron asked, sensing that their argument would just go round
in circles.

“I thought
we could cover the poisons and antidotes work we did at the end of last year.”

“You mean
where one of us got poisoned and we had to save them? You’re not poisoning me,”
Ron grinned.

“Well not
quite following the same methods as Professor Snape,” Hermione sniffed, she’d
never approved of that teaching method. “I don’t fancy accidentally killing you
just as your life’s about to begin.”

“Hermione, if I could choose any person in this school to poison me and
bring me back to the living, it’d be you.”

“Not Professor
Snape? He is the Potions Master after all.”

“Fine,
you’d be the student I’d choose.”

“I suppose
he has to have some use,” Hermione acknowledged, “Otherwise there’d be no point
in Dumbledore paying him.”

It was the
first time that anyone had insulted Severus since Ron had begun his… whatever
ever it was that he had with Severus. He didn’t like it one bit, but he knew
protesting against Hermione’s comment would make him look odd. But Hermione
would also guess that any silence would mean something more was going on, so
Ron managed a laugh as he scratched out the title of his revision on the
parchment.

“Can you
remember the antidote for,” she flicked about the pages in her book, “A child
that has accidentally swallowed magical drain cleaner?”

Ron thought
hard. He took a wild stab, “Crushed dandelion herb, honey, three drops of dragon
blood and crystallized pollen drops?”

“Yes! How
did you know that?” Hermione looked at him.

“I guessed,
you mean I actually got it right!?”

As they
went on, making notes every now and then, Ron found he was actually getting
every answer right. Even Hermione had to pore through her textbook a few times
to check answers she wasn’t sure of, but all of Ron’s guesses were turning out to
be right.

“Well,” she
said, folding her parchment carefully and sliding it into the back of the
textbook, “Maybe you’ve been having extra Potions lessons with Snape in your
mind for months and your subconscious was forgetting them?”

Ron looked
at her. He didn’t have the energy to blush in the fierce heat, he was already
hot. She looked him in the eye and seemed to be asking a silent question.

“I don’t
know,” he shook his head. “I’m not sure right now, okay?”

“This is
weird,” she said quietly. “I don’t know what to say to you.”

“This is
why it’s better if Harry just keeps his mouth shut, you know?” Ron said, and
moved closer to her to lie down in the sun.

Hermione
finished packing her bag and set it to one side, then sighed and laid down next to him, one hand over her eyes. It was a
position which Ron once would have been excited to find himself
in, to experience… Hermione lying next to him in the grass,
their hands centimetres apart.

“When will
you know?” she asked quietly.

“I’m really
not sure.” When Severus decides if he
wants to be with me or not Ron thought without considering it.

“Okay… this
is just a bit frustrating, Ron. We had all those years together, and I hoped it
would just happen one day… and now I realise I might have left it too late.”

Ron didn’t
know what to say. Other than he knew one thing, it certainly was too late for
anything to happen between them, he was too far involved mentally with Severus
for now, even if nothing came between them, he would still have the dreams to
contend with, and he didn’t really want to let them go. But how could he tell
her that, risking hurting her so much? He had never wanted to hurt her.

“I’m
guessing from your silence,” She whispered, “that it really is too late.”

Ron didn’t
say anything, and was surprised when he felt the warmth of her hand close over
his on the grass. He turned his face towards her to see that her face was
coated in tear tracks, dripping down off her skin and on to the grass.

He begged
her with his eyes not to cry any more, but she was in full flow. “Oh god, I’m
so sorry,” he said, giving her hand a squeeze. “I don’t know how,
or why…”

“Don’t be
silly, you don’t have to explain anything to me,” she sniffed, using her free
hand to wipe away the tears.

“I do, but
I can’t just yet. Some things… aren’t settled.”

“What
things?”

“Hermione-”

“You owe it
to me to be honest, as a friend,” Hermione cut in.

Ron
contemplated this and whether she was right or not. Did he owe her honesty
after (for fuck’s sake!) all these
years? She was looking at him intently. He supposed she already knew from
guessing, but wanted to hear it for finality.

“Fine.
This morning I went to see him. I had another dream and I wanted clarification
over something I’d seen. He gave me it. We argued, we talked.
We kissed.”

“You kissed
him?” Hermione gasped, and sat up to look down at Ron.

“Yes. A few times.”

“And… did
you enjoy it?”

“I did. The
question is… whether he enjoyed it.”

“This is
unbelievable.”

“I know
it’s hard to understand why-”

“It’s not
that,” she waved her hand. “Two nights ago this started, and now you’re kissing
him? Now you’re thinking about entering into a relationship with him, if he
wants to? For god’s sake, don’t you think this is too fast?”

“Hermione,
I know it’s fast. And he’s totally freaked out by it all. But the thing is, the
dream I went to ask about… it makes me think we’re tied together in a way that
can’t just be undone. So instead of trying to break the bond, I’m trying to
make it stronger. I can see from your face you think I’m mad.”

“I do,” she
said, staring at him with wide eyes. “And you think this is bad, you wait until
Harry finds out you kissed him. He’s been dealing with this calmly… but it’s
like you once accused me of doing –you’re fraternising with the enemy.”

That hurt
and Ron wasn’t quick enough to hide his reaction on his face. He also knew it
was intended to hurt. Reminding him of Viktor.

“Yes, Ron,
that’s what I passed up for you. International Quidditch star, Viktor Krum. Remember that? Remember
how awful you made me feel?” She was crying again.

Ron nodded and failed to find his voice.

“All that, for this. I could have been happy with him now, you know, we could
have built a life together, instead of wasting my thoughts on you. How can you
do this to me?” Her voice was escalating.

“Please
keep your voice down,” Ron hissed. “I don’t want the whole school knowing about
this.”

Hermione
swallowed and grabbed her bag. “Fine, Ron. Fine. I’ll
see you later, I have to go. I’ve got some revision for Arithmancy
to do.”

“Hermione-”

“Just… no.
I’m not calm enough to deal with you right now. I’ll see you later.”

She stomped
off across the grass, leaving Ron lying down with his head thumping. He needed
to get out of the sun or he’d get sunburnt. He looked up and saw the shadier
track leading round the side of the lake. He hauled himself off the floor,
grabbed his bag, and set off, stomping along with equal stroppiness to
Hermione. He knew it would be hard and he knew it would he difficult for her to
take, but he didn’t expect that reaction when she was normally so calm and
measured… but then he knew she was really hurt. He dipped into the shade and
felt instant relief on his skin. He kept walking, hearing the voices of the
other students fade away until they were replaced with the sound of the water lapping,
and the birds singing. He threw his bag on the ground and followed it with his
body, letting his face fall into a natural frown (or sulk, as his mother would
have pointed out).

The thought
of his mother actually made him stop and check himself. In all of this, he
hadn’t once yet thought of how he might explain this to his family, if he had
to. The thought alarmed him, positively terrified him. He knew what their
reaction would be, firstly to him being gay, secondly to his choice of mate.
His brothers would throw him out. And then he’d have nowhere to go. Especially
if anything went wrong between him and Severus, then he really would be up shit
creek without a paddle.

He
surprised himself further by feeling a stinging in his eyes. He hadn’t cried in
years. The argument with Hermione must have shaken him up more than he first
realised. He sighed, sniffed and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. But
more tears kept coming to the front. He thought he was doing well at being
strong over the whole thing. Yes, it was confusing, but it was also kind of
exciting, and he was feeling new emotions for another human being, which he was
enjoying. He supposed he hadn’t taken the time to stop and feel the confusion
properly, especially over the last day. Maybe that was the real reason he was
crying… and just maybe fear that Severus would say no.
That thought produced a bodily reaction in his stomach, which clenched. The
fear was more pronounced than he realised.

He sniffled
and dragged his arm over his eyes again. He knew what Hermione was saying was
right, this was all happening far too fast and in reality he just wanted to
make time stop for a while because he knew that he only had two and a half
months to make a decision, and that Severus had the same amount of time. If he
decided against, Ron knew, even though it was fast -not to mention stupid and
rash, he would be badly hurt by that. Quite why, he didn’t know. Three days ago
he was a normal, happy 18 year old getting nervous about exams. And then one
night changed everything, faster than he ever could have imagined.

If you hadn’t acted on it, though,
nothing would have changed, the little voice in his mind told him. If you’d not gone and seen him this morning, you might never have
kissed… you might never have had any more than polite conversation and a little
awkwardness. Ron hated to admit it but the voice was right. He had had the
dreams unconsciously, that was true… but his actions since had been done
through his own volition. If he’d never gone to Severus’ office that morning,
they would probably never have kissed. Or maybe they would have, Ron wouldn’t
know. He considered this and chewed his lower lip thoughtfully. It might have
happened anyway. But it did happen because it was his choice to go and ask about
the dream, his choice to stay and chat and his personality that had kept him
there.

So what did
that mean? He knew there would be plenty of difficult tasks ahead of him if he
chose to continue down this route. His family, his friends, exams, the difficulty of arranging time together once he left
school… For the first time the thought came to his mind that Severus had been
right, it was wrong, and he was naïve. He had been so buoyed up by everything
before that he hadn’t had room for anything else. But now, alone, he started to
feel a little ashamed of himself. His only consoling thought, as the
humiliation set in, was that Severus would probably never have agreed to it
anyway. He had seemed so reluctant and nervous of it… it would probably be for
the best if nothing came of it. Only now Ron had to face the prospect of seeing
him every day for the next two and a half months without combusting each time.
And had to stop the dreams somehow, because he wasn’t stupid enough to assume
the dreams would just stop if he didn’t want to have them. No. He’d have to
take the dreamless sleep potion every night. With a surge of annoyance at
himself, he thought how ridiculous he’d been to allow himself to get so carried
away. He bought his hands up and rubbed at his eyes with his fingers, inhaling
deeply.

So he’d
upset Hermione for nothing. Wasn’t that the outcome of his thinking? That
nothing was going to happen because it’d be ridiculous for it to happen, just
as Severus had said. He wasn’t sure. He didn’t have a clue what he thought any
more. Despite the sunshine, and the sparkling lake, he didn’t want to act
melodramatic, but felt the world looked a little less brighter
than it had before. He yawned, suddenly tired, and remembered his early start
that morning. He weighed up his chances of getting into the Hospital Wing
unseen to ask for dreamless sleep potion and something to knock him out at the
same time. He’d have to lie but that didn’t matter, he could say he’d been
suffering from nightmares recently and hadn’t been sleeping well, and needed to
get his system back on track.

Yes, that
sounded perfectly plausible. He got to his feet, wishing he had some kind of
mirror to check his face after his bawling session. He picked up his bag and
slung it over his shoulder, moving quickly over the baked grass. His arms were
burning in the fierce sunlight, he’d not put his robes on that morning, they
weren’t required to wear uniform at weekends. He sped up his pace.

***

A bird was
squawking nearby and Severus stirred. He squeezed his eyes together and
gingerly opened them to be blinded by the sun. With quick realisation, he sat up, he had fallen asleep in the sunlight, which was now
setting behind the castle, sending only a few streaks of light across the
grounds like the one which was causing green spots in front of his eyes. He
stretched and his back was stiff from the hard ground. He staggered to his feet
and yawned again. The grounds were quieter now, very few people remained
outside –he looked at his watch and realised if he didn’t hurry he would miss
dinner. But he didn’t particularly want to turn up in just his clothes, stupidly he was self-concious.
However a rumble in his stomach persuaded him it was worth ignoring the curious
looks which would surely come his way. He put his hands in his pockets and
walked quickly, well aware of the time. As he strode along, getting closer to
the castle, the events of the morning and his afternoon thoughts returned to
him, and he was pleased to find they didn’t alarm him as much as they had when
they occurred. He knew that meant he was more settled over the matter, now he’d
thought things through in his mind and it would be easier for him to make a
decision based on all the facts. Sometimes his logical brain was a massive
help.

He jogged up
the castle steps two at a time, and as he did so a small smile spread over his
lips when the thought came to him that he’d see Ron in the Great Hall. They’d
be seats apart but it wouldn’t matter, all that mattered was that he was
looking forward to seeing his face. So
there’s your decision made… Severus thought to himself, walking through the
entrance and turning right to head to the staff table. It was nearly full, he
noticed, with the exception of Albus and Minerva. He liked nights like this, he
could pretend he was the only teacher there with the status to take charge of
the school… he would be Headmaster. A silly little fancy, but it made him smile
nonetheless. He edged along and took his usual seat, surveying the table to see
his choices, but really he was itching to look up at the Gryffindor table and
search Ron out. He didn’t want to appear so desperate, however, so spooned some
pasta on to his plate first, and even managed to season it at a reasonably slow
pace. That’s enough,
I have to look now… He raised his head as he reached for a glass of water,
and tried to focus his eyes. It was hard amongst all the bobbing heads, he ran
his eyes from the end of the table to the other and back again. He checked
again, but could only locate one redhead with long sweeping hair, someone he
usually avoided focussing on at all costs. Ron’s sister had hair half the
school would kill for, but for him it was a constant reminder he couldn’t bear
to see. She was sitting with Potter and Granger (who he noticed looked thoroughly
miserable). But there was no sign of Ron, and he chewed his food thinking about
where he might be. The three didn’t appear to be saying much. Worry started to
creep through his thoughts, it wasn’t like Ron Weasley to miss meals. Because
his family are too poor to feed him at home he eats like a carthorse here.
Severus dropped his fork with a clatter. Next to him, Professor Sprout looked
at him.

“Are you
okay, Severus?”

“Yes, I’m
fine,” he nodded, and picked up the fork to spear some pasta on it.

She turned
away without asking any more questions, as they always did. Not many of them
spoke to him if they could help it. His thoughts were rushing around. He
couldn’t believe the vitriol his own mind had just spouted about someone he was
starting to feel for. Was he really so cruel? He was shocked at himself.

Around him
the food started to change, and desserts began to replace the empty platters
and tureens. He’d forgotten how he’d nearly missed dinner. He ate the rest of
his food quickly and crossed his knife and fork across the plate, and stood up
immediately to leave. He wanted to know where Ron was. He wanted to know so
much it was alarming him. His possessive nature hadn’t reared its head for such
a long time he was quite startled by its resurgence. Thinking hard, he made his
way from the hall feeling better for food and water. He couldn’t just march up
to Gryffindor Tower to ask for him,
that would look suspicious. Out of the corner of his eye a student
signed the clipboard where people signed out. Maybe Ron had left the castle? He
hurried over and snatched up the board, quickly scanning the scribbled names
but Ron’s just wasn’t there.

He set the
board down and walked back to the dungeon entrance. His feet carried him but
his mind was elsewhere, as he started to doubt whether Ron had successfully
made it through the tunnel, had he walked past him injured or worse? Severus
shook the thought from his head, he was pretty sure that Ron had not been in
the tunnel when he’d walked through. He exhaled and had reached the fork in the
corridors.

“Professor,”
a voice called, from the right of the fork; a student.

“Yes?”
Severus said, glad his voice sounded strong.

“I’m just
out to meet my father in the village,” Draco said, “We were wondering if you’d
like to join us.”

Not in a million fucking years. “Ah, thank you for the invite,
Draco, but I’m just heading back to my room to do some work which needs to be
done as soon as possible,” he lied. “Have a good evening though.”

Draco
nodded and smiled at him, and made to move off, but not before his eyes swept
up and down Severus’ casual attire with a questioning look. Severus just smiled
back and turned to walk down to his office. Nothing like the stare of a Malfoy to make you feel inadequate. He unlocked
his office and lit the candles. The usual cold air greeted him and it felt
stark after the warmth he’d experienced lying in the sun all afternoon. The
room also felt huge and empty. Lonely, one might say. He took his usual seat
behind his desk and inhaled. The clock told him it was half past seven. A long
night stretched ahead of him alone, when he was starting to feel he’d really
quite like the company of one person in particular.

He pulled a
bottle of wine out of the cabinet in his desk –he might as well enjoy himself if
he was going to have spend the night alone. He
magically worked the cork out of the bottle neck and poured the rich red liquid
into a waiting glass. He knew he drank far too much, but it wasn’t harming
anyone else. As he took a mouthful he wondered if that would have to change… if
the amount he drank, the amount of times a week he fell exhausted into bed with
his head spinning, that was, would have to change. When Ron visited more
frequently, he supposed he would have to stop. It would do him good.

He noticed
there had been a subtle shift in his thinking –not if but when. He seemed to
have accepted the fact that it would happen, whatever the consequences. Maybe
it helped that Ron seemed so assured that everything would be okay. It made him
feel more confident by proxy. He looked about the office and realised that Ron
was actually right, it was a dingy dump. He swallowed some more wine and stood up, picking his wand up from where he’d left it on the desk.
He might not be able to work wonders, but he could certainly try.

***

“Is he
breathing?” Neville asked worriedly, peering round the curtain.

“He’s
breathing,” Harry nodded and checked again to be sure.

“And you
can’t wake him up?” Dean asked dubiously. “Do you think we should get someone?”

Harry
looked around worriedly. “I don’t know.”

“How long
exactly has he been asleep?” Dean asked.

“Well, he
was asleep yesterday at 6pm, and its midday now.”

“I think we
should be getting someone,” Neville nodded his head, “Is sleeping for 18 hours
normal without good reason?”

Harry
shrugged. “Maybe, I don’t know?” He thought on it. “Look, you stay here with
him until I get back, I’m just going to go and ask some questions in the
Hospital Wing. He’d kill us if we raised the alarm without real reason.”

He left the
room and took a myriad of hidden passages to bring him out quickly near the
hospital wing. He walked in, and was glad it was empty.

“Mr Potter,
what have you done this time?” Madam Pomfrey asked
briskly, getting to her feet from where she was sorting bandages.

“Nothing,”
he said proudly, it was always a change to go in the hospital wing uninjured.
“I need to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind?”

She looked
at him interestedly.

“Well, my friend, Ron-”

“Weasley?”

Harry
nodded, and opened his mouth to speak but she cut him off.

“He was in
yesterday asking me for dreamless sleep potion and something to help him get to
sleep last night, he said he had been having nightmares and was having trouble
sleeping properly. So I gave him the necessary aides to help him get some
rest.”

“Oh, so
that’s why he’s not waking up!”

“Probably not. He’ll wake up of his own accord when his body is ready to. Let him
rest.”

“Right,
thank you,” Harry said, hoping he was hiding his confusion.

He smiled
and left, thinking hard. Ron had asked for dreamless sleep potion and something
to knock him out. What did that mean, he’d had enough of the greasy git
infiltrating in on his sleep? Or something else? He
thought back to how strangely Hermione had acted all night and welled up
whenever someone mentioned Ron’s name. Something was going on but he couldn’t
place what.

***

Severus was
really starting to get worried now. Ron hadn’t been at breakfast or lunch. As
well as the fact he found it odd, he found himself worrying that Ron had been
without three meals now and must be either out of the castle without
permission, or hiding somewhere for whatever reason. He had nobody he could
realistically ask without arousing suspicion, he was inwardly cursing that most
of the time he was a total and utter bastard. He wanted to show Ron what he had
done to his office for him, he’d worked into the night
and looked forward to catching him after breakfast. He was sure he’d like the
changes he’d made. He had sent a note, hoping the owl would find a way to
deliver it. It simply said ‘I need to see you. SS.’

***

Ron could
hear a faint tapping. It was annoying him, because he was trying to call back
the details of the dream that were trickling away from him. It hadn’t been
clean, he could remember that much. He groaned and opened his eyes, hearing the
constant tapping. He blindly felt his way out of the bed and peered around for
the source of the tapping. He even looked at the floor before he checked the
windows, he felt so bleary. But once the owl spotted him it tapped even harder
–the glass was in danger. Ron pulled open the window and saw with interest it
was an internal school owl. He took the letter and watched it take flight back
up to the Owlery. He shut the window and staggered
back to his fourposter, he ripped open the letter seeing it was addressed to him,
and tried to focus his eyes.

‘I need to see you. SS.’

Severus.
Ron smiled at the name. With a jolt he dropped the letter. He’d been dreaming
of Severus that night but he’d taken the potion which should have registered
him all but unconscious. He had still had his dreams fighting against even the
strongest herbs he could take. What did that mean?

Excitedly,
he tore the note from the floor and shoved it under his pillow. He hastily
dressed, fingers falling over each other as he hurried to get out of the
dormitory before anyone found him. He knew that he must have been asleep for a
long time and that his friends would be questioning why. They were probably all
in the common room waiting to accost him as he walked down the stairs, but he
wanted to get to Severus as soon as possible. He slapped his hands against his
thighs as he was thinking. Harry’s trunk caught his
eye as he stood there, he knew that the invisibility
cloak resided within it. Harry wouldn’t mind, he supposed.

He was on
his knees and unlocking the trunk before he could think about it any more. His
fingers closed around the silken fabric and he tugged, locking the trunk behind
him. Harry would probably never even know it was gone,
he rarely used it these days anyway. Ron threw the cloak around himself and experienced the weird shiver when he saw his
body disappear in the adjacent mirror.

It was
easy, getting through the tower and down through the castle after that. Nobody
cast him a second glance. He just had to hope now that Severus would be in his
office alone. Ron pressed himself against the cold wall as some Slytherins made their way past him three abreast, he even
sucked his gut in and it was still a narrow miss. It was just slowing him down and
he was getting frustrated. He crept off, trying to stop his footsteps echoing
in the narrow corridor, he followed the fork and felt a rush of relief as the
door came into sight. He knocked. He couldn’t hear any noise inside and felt
his heart sink. He waited for a moment. He knocked again.

“Who is
it?” Severus’ voice called.

“It’s me,”
Ron said quietly, hoping he was near enough to the other side of the door to
hear.

The door
opened a sliver and Ron realised he was invisible, he
lifted up the edge of the cloak. He’d interrupted him in the shower, and he’d
answered the door wrapped in a towel. Ron bit his lip with a smile, looking
purposefully at the bare wet skin of his torso.

Severus
stepped back to admit him and closed the door quickly. He locked it and cast a
muffling spell wordlessly. He stared at Ron with hungry eyes, he’d not seen his
face in over 24 hours and he hadn’t realised how much he’d missed it. He
stepped forward and placed a kiss on the soft lips in relief.

“Where have
you been, I was worried about you…” He whispered, sinking a hand into Ron’s
soft auburn hair.

“I’ll tell
you in a minute,” Ron closed his eyes and leaned into the touch. “Do you
normally answer the door in a towel?”

“Only when
I want the person on the other side to see,” he laughed, blushing
a little. You never blush!

Ron smiled
and opened his eyes. “Oh my God, what did you do to this place?” he exclaimed,
pushing past Severus to look at the reformed room.

The walls
were clean and dry, and there were hangings and rugs injecting colour. The jars
of pickled objects had been covered up with emerald green hangings –well he is a Slytherin-
and there were was a plant on the desk. The old sofa looked like it had been
re-upholstered. Ron noticed the changes continued through the door to the
bedroom, he walked without asking permission and saw more of the same, and the
bed had been spruced up with new bedclothes and hangings. It looked lighter
somehow. Ron then noticed that was because of the presence of a window, high in
the ceiling, in a corner.

“It’s the
only part of my office that isn’t underground… the light isn’t brilliant, but
it’s better than nothing…” Severus said quietly, fighting a shiver. He was,
after all, standing just in a towel and he hadn’t yet lit the fire.

“It’s great,”
Ron turned round. “What made you do all this?”

Severus
looked at him levelly.

“Oh,” Ron
said, his eyebrows raising. “Right.”

“What?”
Severus felt the first blow of worry. Maybe Ron had been hiding from him…

“Well. It’s
a long story. Why don’t you get dressed, you’ll catch your death standing here
like that,” Ron motioned to his towel.

“Right,”
Severus said, recognising how hollow his voice sounded.

Had Ron
changed his mind?

“I’ll just
be a minute. Make yourself, uh, at home,” Severus
nodded, and turned back into the bathroom where he closed the door.

Ron walked
back into the living room and sparked a fire alight in the grate with his wand.
He threw on some of the wood in the basket by the hearth and sent in some more
shoots of fire. He straightened up, and sat down on the sofa. It smelled so
much cleaner than the last time he’d sat on it… he felt a surge of assurance as
he saw how much effort Severus had put into making the room better for him. And
that really confused him. He assumed before he went to sleep, when he took the
potions, that he was drawing a line under his feelings, or as much as he could.
But then the dream potion had failed, he had continued to dream about Severus
through the night in one big long continuous spiel of life. And, more than
that, he had been so utterly convinced that Severus would choose to decline the
suggestion that he’d shed a few more tears as he fell asleep. And yet here the
room was, looking amazing, just as he’d asked.

In the
bathroom, Severus was bracing himself against the sink. Had he done the wrong
thing, changing the room about? Ron seemed surprised, confused by the move.
Severus didn’t understand, he’d stood and asked for the changes yesterday
morning, so he’d performed them… and now Ron looked as though it had been a
smack in the face. He gripped the sink tighter as he realised his fingers were
shaking. There was only one way to find out, he knew, to go into the office and
sit, and talk it through… and reach a conclusion. But he had always been
cowardly… and now he couldn’t face the possibility of rejection. Ron was
waiting for him though. He sniffed and stood up straight, looking at his sullen
reflection in the mirror. He looked so pale. Now or never, he thought, and left the bathroom.

“Oh, I
could have done that!” he said politely as he saw the fire gathering momento.

“No
problem,” Ron smiled, and looked at Severus.

Gingerly,
Severus sat down next to him. “So where were you?”

Ron kicked
off his trainers and turned to face Severus, one leg tucked up under his body,
the other dangling on the floor. “I was asleep.”

Severus
raised an eyebrow.

“I was asleep because I took a potion for dreamless sleep and another to knock
me six weeks from Sunday.”

Severus’
mouth fell open with hurt. He knew what Ron taking the potion meant. “You
wanted to forget me…”

Ron took
his hand and pulled it into his own lap. “I thought I did.”

“Why?”
Severus heard his own voice getting shamefully quieter.

“Because I
had a moment where I decided this whole thing was ridiculous, and I convinced
myself that you would say no.”

“What
bought that on?”

“I had a
fight with Hermione,” Ron sighed. “She told me it was too fast, too stupid. She
couldn’t believe what happened here yesterday.”

Severus
nodded and waited for Ron to continue.

“So I went
off and had a bit of a cry,” Severus just wanted to hold him, “And managed to
talk myself into believing that she was right.”

“So you
went and obtained the potions,” Severus said matter-of-factly.

Ron nodded.
“And I took them, and I cried myself to sleep because I didn’t want to take
them, it just felt like the right thing to do.”

“And then
what, you got my note when you woke up?”

“No. And
then when I fell asleep, I found myself dreaming about you anyway.”

Ron looked
at him intently. “You beat a really strong concoction of drugs,” he nodded.
“That’s got to be something pretty strong there.”

Severus
nodded. “It would seem so.”

“And now
you’ve re-decorated your office for me.”

“Yes, I
suppose I did.”

“So I
convinced myself you’d say no to all this… and it looks like I was wrong?”

It seemed
to be that now or never point. Severus exhaled slowly, looking over Ron’s face.

“I can take
it if you’ve changed your mind,” he said resolutely, “I can.”

Oh god I don’t know. I don’t know. Severus couldn’t find the words.

Ron was
fidgeting a little desperately, “Please say something.”

“Yes,” he
breathed.

“I’m
sorry?” Ron frowned. “Yes what?”

“Yes to all
of it.”

“You mean…”

Severus
nodded once. “If you want.”

An
infectious smile had broken out on Ron’s face. “Are you sure?”

“It’s not
going to be easy for either of us… but there’s just something about you, I
can’t deny it. I’ve missed you every second since you left me yesterday. I
haven’t felt like that about anyone in a long time.”

“I missed
you too,” Ron said, inching closer.

Severus
reached over and placed a hand at the nape of Ron’s neck, pulling him closer
for a kiss.

“Mmm,” Ron groaned, literally turning to putty in his hands.

Severus
smiled and pulled back to rest his forehead on Ron’s. “But we’re still going to
take it slow. I’m not in this for shits and giggles.”

“Oka- what?” Ron laughed, “What the hell kind of
phrase is that?”

“Maybe
you’re too young to know it,” Severus said wryly.

“Or you’re
old enough to recognise it.”

“Do you
remember what happened the last time you called me old?”

“Yes, you
left me gagging for more on the floor.”

Severus
laughed. “I’d not looked at it that way.”

“Maybe you
should.”

“Maybe I
should,” he nodded in agreement.

Ron crept
closer and entwined himself round Severus’ body. He smelt like cinnamon and
Christmas. He told him as much.

“Oh!”
Severus exclaimed, and Ron looked at him. “The other night in the pub, where I
committed that slightly illegal and foul play invasion into your mind… I could
smell that, but didn’t recognise what that was. I smell like that?”

Ron nodded.
“I’ve forgiven you by the way.”

“Why?”

“Because if
you’d never looked in my mind, I’d never have had the bottle to come and find
you the next day… and we wouldn’t be here like this now.”

Severus
thought on that for a moment. “No, maybe we wouldn’t.”

Ron kissed
the side of Severus’ neck tenderly and was pleased to feel a shiver.

“Slowly,”
Severus said determinedly. “I’m an old man, my heart
can’t take much excitement.”

“You’ve got
a good forty years of life in you yet,” Ron grinned, playfully smoothing over
his heart.

The thought
seemed to render Severus solemn. “What have I said?” Ron asked.

“The age
difference is getting to me,” he admitted.

“Look at it
this way. It seems a big difference now. But, when I’m thirty and you’re fifty,
is it going to seem so different?”

“I think
it’ll always feel different. And… obviously we’re talking about way in the
future here and not to presume the longevity of any of this, but when I’m
eighty and you’re just turning sixty… you’ll still have the golden years of
your life to spend with me, old, decrepit, probably ill.”

Ron nodded.
“Probably. But you are the premier Potions educator in
the country… I’m pretty sure you’ll be able to instruct me in your medication.”

Severus
chuckled, “That is true.”

Ron kissed
his cheek. “You think about me in forty years time?”

Severus
rolled his eyes, “I might.”

“You really
think we have that much of a future?”

“Don’t
you?” Severus sounded a little alarmed.

“Shh,” Ron whispered. “I hadn’t quite thought to sixty, I’ll
admit… but I made it to thirty and fifty, isn’t that enough for now?”

Severus
smiled, “You’re right.”

Ron looked
at the fire, and thought how ridiculous it was that they were sitting in front
of it considering the fierce heat of the sun that day.

“I can’t really
do anything about the temperature,” Severus commented, “The fire has to stay, otherwise we’ll both freeze and be ill all the time.”

“It’s
fine,” Ron said. “Nothing like the warmth of a good fire.”

Severus
nodded, and traced his fingers over the neckline of Ron’s t-shirt. “Did you see
anyone before you came down here?”

Ron shook
his head, “I used the cloak to get out of the common room.”